Organization of your supplies

[Organized Crafter]

How do you organize your supplies? What are your biggest challenges? What would you like to learn more about? Cardmaking and Scrapbooking mostly, but Rubber Stamps too. I'll be teaching some organization classes on Create and Craft TV next month. I live in the USA and we do things a bit different here. So I'd love to hear what you're needs and challenges are. Thanks so much for helping me with this!

[Christa]

In the UK our biggest challenge is that we generally have far less space...I have seen craft rooms in the USA that are bigger than my entire house!!!

Scrap booking and paper crafting in general is not as big a deal here as in the USA and the products available to us and storage for those products is limited and very expensive by comparison.

Purpose built storage is starting to be the way many are forced to go but this can prove expensive if you can't DIY and don't have a family member with the necessary skills..

Since create and craft is not really about teaching and all about selling, I can only assume your teaching organisation classes is going to be product based ?

Do let us know when you are on air...I rarely watch because C&C customer service is generally pants and they sell mostly kits which I don't use...but would try to keep an eye out because organisation tips are always welcome.

[Caroleecrafts]

We also do not have the organising supplies that you have over there. I have watched the Amanda's and wish we had half of those products to be able to utilise. Know I could be so much tidier if I could source more varied storage

[hazelsmail]

Hi yes do let us know when you will be on air as will be interesting to watch.

[indri]

I mostly do quilling, I have kept all my papers neatly in a small craft box, but do have a huge bag of quilling papers that I was given a while back, I have been through everso briefly, but it is too much for my little craft box. I am never going to have a craft room, I'll never have the space for one and like crafting in front of the TV anyway, so it would almost be pointless. I just try not to buy more stuff than I actually need. I'm getting away from the "oh I'll buy that while it's cheap, I'm sure it'll come in useful one day in the dim and distant future" and instead buying things when I need them. I do have stuff still stashed away right at the bottom of boxes that still haven't been used 15 or more years later!

[Alison13]

Hi. I watch C&C and have bought far more stuff than I can realistically use in the foreseeable future. I make cards but not to sell. I would like ideas on how to store ideas and samples of things that do / do not work so that I do no reinvent the wheel with every card I make. I would also like ideas for using up what I already have. But that would probably not go down well with C&C! Thanks for asking for our views and good luck with the shows.

[3dDave]

I must be a one off because I rarely buy loads more than I need (Is it because I'm a bloke? Sorry ladies, what's that? Buy one get one free? you didn't need the flippin' first one!) I usually do an image then take the card to the craft shop and then match the papers etc to the image, usually buy 3 papers and decide when I get home. Mind you, the craft room looks like it has been rolled and put upright again or a burglar has been on the rampage but I always know where everything is. (Lol)

Dave.

[Alison13]

Must be a bloke thing! Good for you.

[Christa]

I must be a one off because I rarely buy loads more than I need (Is it because I'm a bloke? Sorry ladies, what's that? Buy one get one free? you didn't need the flippin' first one!) I usually do an image then take the card to the craft shop and then match the papers etc to the image, usually buy 3 papers and decide when I get home. Mind you, the craft room looks like it has been rolled and put upright again or a burglar has been on the rampage but I always know where everything is. (Lol)

Dave.

A man thing? I doubt it...have you seen a man shed lately? Filled with useless junk.....

Unfortunately the Dave approach would not work for me. I never quite know what I am going to be asked to make next, I do not have a supplier within an hour of here and I am (thankfully) usually working my way through an order list... so although I might hope (and even plan) to keep supplies to a minimum, its probably not going to happen anytime soon. I don't do unnecessary BOGOF...but I will confess to buying a staple item because I could not locate the one I knew I had already My work space is definitely organised...

organised chaos

Wonder what happened the the OP? ...doesn't appear to have returned to read our wonderfully helpful replies...

[Which_Crafts]

I am terrible at being organised! Everytime I have a tidy up half an hour later it is a complete mess again, I can never find anything once I've tidied it away. Before I got my craft shop I was always in complete chaos in my stock room. I knew where somethings were but the amount of boxes I had I could never located the item that had been ordered, soooooo glad it's now all in the shop!

I find the hardest items to store are punches, they are so bulky and take up too much room! I'm always losing my dies and never have the right glue to hand! That's the one bonus of having a craft shop though, if I run out of something then I can just 'borrow' it from the shop :P

Stickers, rub-ons and little embellishments are a pain, where do other people store half finished packets? I always end up with never being able to find the right coloured gems or alphas when I know I've already started a packet. I tell you I'm a craft room disaster

[Christa]

I am terrible at being organised! Everytime I have a tidy up half an hour later it is a complete mess again, I can never find anything once I've tidied it away. Before I got my craft shop I was always in complete chaos in my stock room. I knew where somethings were but the amount of boxes I had I could never located the item that had been ordered, soooooo glad it's now all in the shop!

I find the hardest items to store are punches, they are so bulky and take up too much room! I'm always losing my dies and never have the right glue to hand! That's the one bonus of having a craft shop though, if I run out of something then I can just 'borrow' it from the shop :P

Stickers, rub-ons and little embellishments are a pain, where do other people store half finished packets? I always end up with never being able to find the right coloured gems or alphas when I know I've already started a packet. I tell you I'm a craft room disaster

I have a large percentage of my punches wall mounted on rails so I can see them at a glance and they are easy to grab when I need them...mini punches are on a mini ledge above the rails and the few fancy ones that I use rarely are in a plastic basket.

I tend not to use stickers and I cut my own alphas so store them in packs according to size style and material used (I tend to cut extras in plain and colour them as I go) but I do use gems - loose gems are in little containers or mini RUBoxes and for the self adhesive gems I tend to clip the carrier sheet to a piece of colour coded card and store them in an open box index file style

I used to be a nightmare for card...I was always cutting into a fresh sheet when I had loads of decent sized off cuts..so I started storing 12x12 card in resealable bags with an A4 document holder piggybacked to the front and all the usable off-cuts go in there. (Strips of card less than 2" wide go into the punch out bag for when I need to punch a couple of smaller elements or a border or two)) Now I always check the A4 (or punch out bag) before I open the seal on the 12x12...it works a treat.

I so want a craft shop....

[3dDave]

A man thing? I doubt it...have you seen a man shed lately? Filled with useless junk.....

Unfortunately the Dave approach would not work for me. I never quite know what I am going to be asked to make next, I do not have a supplier within an hour of here and I am (thankfully) usually working my way through an order list... so although I might hope (and even plan) to keep supplies to a minimum, its probably not going to happen anytime soon. I don't do unnecessary BOGOF...but I will confess to buying a staple item because I could not locate the one I knew I had already My work space is definitely organised...

organised chaos

Wonder what happened the the OP? ...doesn't appear to have returned to read our wonderfully helpful replies...

My man shed is filled with useless junk, and when I am in it scratching my head looking for something, a useless man! (Lol) My workspace is organised, its a 2 feet square tabletop! can't go far wrong there?
The OP has indeed gone I think, Your fault going on about the size of craft rooms in the USA. Nothing to do with me. (He-he)

Dave.

[Christa]

My man shed is filled with useless junk, and when I am in it scratching my head looking for something, a useless man! (Lol) My workspace is organised, its a 2 feet square tabletop! can't go far wrong there?
The OP has indeed gone I think, Your fault going on about the size of craft rooms in the USA. Nothing to do with me. (He-he)

Dave.

I think it possibly had more to do with the observation that C&C is a selling channel and not teaching platform, than the size issue.... but hey ho...

I wonder if I might try a two feet square table top???? At present I have a ten and a half feet by four feet run of work table...with approx six square inches of free space in which to work ...

[3dDave]

I think it possibly had more to do with the observation that C&C is a selling channel and not teaching platform, than the size issue.... but hey ho...

I wonder if I might try a two feet square table top???? At present I have a ten and a half feet by four feet run of work table...with approx six square inches of free space in which to work ...

Blimey Christa, your table is bigger than my craft room!! You must make cards that can be used as Hang gliders after the event. Size isn't everything. (That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it LOL)

Dave.

[Christa]

The idea of the long run of work tables was that I would have 'stations' in which to work the various elements of the projects... In theory that should be fabulous..in practice is it simple chaos. Some people need a tidy space in which to work - not me.

Before it was a craft room this used to be my home office and was converted from the smallest bedroom... I have completely outgrown it but dare not move to the much larger spare room because I just know I will simply expand my mess to fill the available space... Here I can kid myself that the room is the problem...so yep I guess size does matter