Dee's Thursday Tips ~ My Scrap Paper Bin

I thought I would start something new for Thursdays. I'm going to be doing Dee's Thursday Tips. These will be tips I have found useful as I'm learning cardmaking. Some of it you may already know but I'm going to share them anyway. ;P

So, today I will be sharing what I am doing right now. I'm reorganizing my scrap paper bin. Anyone who scrapbooks or makes cards will have a plentiful stash of leftover scrap pieces. My current system is totally not working. So, time to revamp!!

I have 3 bins that are 12x12 and organized in these categories:

1. solid cardstock
2. large cardstock pieces
3. small cardstock pieces

This is an example of what my bin looks like. Look at all those papers, and I'll tell you when I'm looking for a smaller piece of paper, it sure is time consuming to look through all those papers to find what I need.


So.... here is what I have done:

I had a bunch of 8.5" x 11" file folders that I was going to use for Aizen's lap games and games to make for him. Since he is still destructive, I'll buy more file folders in the summer and get some of those made. I bought these in a box of 100 at staples.

Here I have measured them out to cut at 8 inches. That cuts off the main flappy part at the top and makes it almost a perfect rectangle. On one side there is a tiny little notch still there, but it will get covered up, so no worries.



Next, I cut out a bunch of 8" x 2" pieces of light cardstock. By light cardstock I mean it's Very flexible, not as thick as regular cardstock and thicker than paper. The kind I get is from walmart and I use it to make my envelopes.

Next, I scored it down the middle at the 1" mark, folded over and defined the crease with my bone folder. The piece on the left shows the piece cut out (I did a lot at one time, I like that system of doing one part of a project at a time when mass producing something), and then the pieces on the right show them all nicely folded.



Next I used my tape runner and put it on both sides. Then attached one to each side so that the scrap paper will not fall out. In this picture the left side is not done, and the right it. I could have made it prettier with designer paper but I've got A LOT of these to make so white it was.



Here is one of my favourite papers to use. As you can see, there are lots of different sizes and now when I go to look for a piece they will all be together.



I then cut a piece of that paper at 4.5" x 2" and this will go onto the front of the file folder.



Here is that little label on the front of the file folder. I made it big like this so that when I am flipping through them, I can easily see what paper it is that I want.



Here is a look of what the papers look like inside the little folder. Now when I want to use a specific paper, I just need to take the folder out and dump the contents onto the table to see what size I will use.



And last, here are the ones I did last night and partly this morning. It's in a little portable file folder carrier. It will eventually go into either a filing cabinet or a small shelf thing that will be under the table whenever I get my craft nook finished.


Thanks for looking. I hope this may help you with your scrap paper problem. Dee =)