Album, Cardstock & Paper Organization

Today, I'm going to share with you my organization for my albums, cardstock, and papers. This system is all being changed up now that I have made a 100% commitment to pocket scrapbooking, but I will share with you the changes when they are finished.

I love paper. I make no bones about it. If you don't absolutely love pretty paper, I am not sure we can be friends. I mean, how can you not love paper? I mean seriously!

I have tens of thousands of sheets of paper. No joke. I used to buy multiple sheets of my favorites, the ones I couldn't live without, the ones I knew I would use over and over and over and over etc. I have paper for almost every theme imaginable. I even had cowboy paper....I'm not a cowboy. Don't know any....don't ride horses either. One of our dogs used to wear bandanas so I think I started adding to the theme because of Oscar. I'll use the paper with some of my farm visits. No shortage of them around here! That's one of the reasons I absolutely looooooooooove living in the Finger Lakes.

All of my 12x12 papers are in 13x15 zipper bags. Each bags contains one collection. And by collection I mean Apple Cider from BoBunny, Silhouette from Close to My Heart, Alpine Frost from SEI, Cupcake from Basic Grey....does that give you an idea what I mean? I sort by theme not brand because...well...you'll see in a minute. A picture is worth a thousand words or 12 thousand in this case. :)

Each cubby on my Expedit contains a theme or several themes. The Expedit isn't labeled with the categories.  I kept that list on my MacBook. I made numbered labels for my Expedits....yup that is plural. I have 2 of the 25 cube Expedits. You'll see the second one soon! I should do a blog post about the labels I made, too.

So that's my messy paper collection. Ugh. Remember, I don't like messy. I'm probably the most anal scrapbooker alive. I have to clean as I scrapbook. I can't stand having the table covered with stuff. I just get so stressed. It's so weird. Anyway, this paper arrangement is in for a major overhaul!

My second Expedit holds my mountain of cardstock and my completely and empty albums. A few themes of my paper collection are stored here.....they don't fit in the other one. The top rows have empty and full albums. The bottom contains fabric bins from Ikea that hold my cardstock. The cardstock is all sorted by color. I have plastic inserts in each bin that divide the colors. I sort the cardstock by ROY G BIV and Browns and Blacks. Browns include the creams and ivories. Backs include the greys and whites. The cardstock sheets are all standing up in these bins. This Expedit, too, is going to be remodeled in the near future.

I know Ikea does not make the Expedit anymore. Big, huge sad face. I love them! I know I'm not the only crafter who loves them. Ikea replaced the Expedit with the Kallax. I believe the Kallax only comes in 20 cubes though. I could be totally wrong! I haven't seen them in person yet. I will next month when I go to Charlotte! I'm off to Raleigh for a huge crop. My understanding is that inside of the cubes are the same dimensions so they will still hold scrapbook albums!

Stop back tomorrow for a post on the numbered labels I created for my Expedits. I'm going to dig out the photos right now! :)