Since I began seriously making cards 3 years ago, I have found great use for stamps. Especially decorative scrolls, sentiments, and alphabet sets. My collection has grown and I find myself forgetting what I have. Not that I would buy duplicates, but I forget to use what I have and I go back to the same few stamps over and over again.
To alleviate that problem, I decided to make a stamp catalog. I spent an afternoon sorting out my wood-mounted stamps into categories (I will do my smaller collection of acrylic stamps another day). Then I stamped each onto their category page and put them together into a binder (that also holds other reference materials).
Behold, my stamps:
Now I just need to flip through these pages of stamps to get inspired and see at a glance what I have to use.
I get my stamps from 3 main sources. Michaels or Joannes (mostly from the dollar bin at Michaels, but if it's a regular stamp, I always try to use a coupon), garage sales and thrift stores (my guilty pleasure of treasure hunting), and from other people (my mom mostly, but my coworkers all know that I'm always looking for crafty castoffs). I have only purchased a very small number of stamps at full price. That's the main reason my collection has not gotten out of control- stamps are expensive!!!
So:
Where do you get your stamps?
How do you organize them?
Do you have a stamp catalog?
Let me know!