Alcohol Marker Storage

Well, my crafty pals...

It's countdown time...

The big gigantic ridiculously enormous crafting garage sale is just one week away...

I've got 36 monster sized storage bins full of card making "stuff" to sell...

and today, I will be going through the final 50 bins to see what's trash...
what's "sell"
and what's "keep"

Then...the pricing begins...

My goal is to be completely ready by Wednesday.

That's my self imposed deadline.

Wish me luck!

Today, Gary will be working with me..
doing the heavy lifting and moving of things..

and hopefully...by the end of the day...
the last 50 bins of "stuff" will have been looked at...gone through...and moved to the selling area.

I have to confess...

I am already "keeping" much more than I wanted to keep...

I'm not sure what I'll do about that "problem"...

But...

that's a situation for  another time...

Right now..I need to finish going through the remaining bins...and get things ready for next weekend.

It should be a fun day...

there will be 13 of us...

all scrappers and card makers...

selling our de-stashed items.

I wish that ALL of you lived nearby so that you could stop by for some insane bargains.

IF you DO live nearby

c'mon over...

With all of the Garage Sale Prep going on...

I don't anticipate having much time to create...

which means there's not a lot of card making going on...

or sharing my cards here at my blog..

But....for those of you who have asked about how I store my Spectrum Noir Alcohol Markers

I did have time to take a few pics to share with you.

I've been in my new studio for about 8 months now...

and...

since "moving in"...

I've gotten lots of questions from fellow card makers

about how I've organized things.
Everything.

If you do;t already know about me...
I'll start out by telling you that..

I'm a BIG Felix-Unger-type

a Neat-nik...

Organizer...

Tidy-freak.

(in THIS way..I Am my Mother's daughter)
I DO NOT function well in an untidy environment.
I was this way as a child..
I was this way in my profession
(my office looked like an Ikea ad)
and I am this way in my homeland personal life.

Everything in my studio has it's place...and that place is labelled.

However..

real estate space in the studio has become precious..

there are no vacancies...

(haha)

Every inch of shelf space...

...every drawer
every inch of everything is accounted for. 

So my Alcohol markers  made their home in an unexpected place...

by necessity.

At first.....I wasn't pleased.

But as time passed..I realized that I love the way they're organized..

and I love where they are "parked".

For me..

it' works wonderfully.

So..here we go...
I'll show you how they're organized and stored..
and where they're "parked"

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the ArtBin SemiSatchel.

I have quite a few of them in the studio

and use them for large die  that are stored on magnetic cards...

6x6 paper pad storage

and completed card storage.

The semi satchel is a great size..

VERY well made...

very hefty and solid..

it has a secure lock...

heavy duty dividers 

and a great sturdy handle.

You can find the Semi Satchel on the internet 

priced anywhere from $12 to almost $30...

 If you plan on ordering after you read through this blog post...

be sure to shop around!

When I placed my Spectrum Alcohol markers in the Semi Satchel

I opted to keep the boxes that they came in...

I cut off the lids and was left with the box only...

you can see the individual boxes in the satchel in the photo below

You can also see the dividers that come with the satchel.
The boxes just see as a holder...
so that when I take markers out to color...
the remaining ones don't flop of and fall down
(see...I told you that I am an obsessive neat-ink.)

I chose to organize the markers by color family...

When you order them..you may have an IG marker in one set...and an IG in another...etc...

so..

I did NOT keep the sets together in the configuration that they come in when you purchase them.

Instead...I gathered up all of the same color family (by letter coding) and put them together...

This made sense to me for choosing colors and blending with ease.

The markers that you see here are the complete set...

all of the sets currently available.

IF they come out with another set...I am in trouble!

haha

because as you can see...

this case is FULL.

I also deliberately chose NOT to have all pinks and reds together....blues together.. etc etc

because for me...that is confusing to the eye when choosing colors to work with.
I didn't want to look at the markers when coloring..
and look at a sea of color that made no sense to the eye.
So I chose to put some contrasting colors next to each other.
To y personal eye...they stand out much better...
and allow me to choose colors with ease.

When finished coloring...I ALWAYS put the markers back in the spot designated for them..

(Emphasis on A L W A Y S....they never get returned to another section of the satchel)

After just a short time...

I knew the "layout" within the satchel contents by heart...

and now...I can reach for a marker blindfolded...

For me...this system makes coloring so easy.

So while it's great to have all of the markers organized in one place...

the dilemma was....where to keep the Satchel.

I am TRULY out of space.
No space vacancies in the studio.
ZERO

After a big mental duel with my neat-ink tidy self...

I negotiated...with myself...(haha)

for a spot on the floor..

right next to the main desk.

A spot where I keep my Stampin Up ink caddy

(because I was not willing to give desk, counter or work table space to the caddy.

The floor space is kind of a "dead " space...

So putting the Satchel there seemed like the best option.

(well....if I really want to think about it....it was really the ONLY option.)

and so...

here's the satchel...
the markers are in the FLAT position...

next to the ink caddy...

and my back-up trimmer.

(Those wheels are my Raskog ....parked on the far right)

They're easy to move out of the way when I want to get into the drawers under the counter...

So...

for me..this works.

So there you have it...

my simple organization and storage of my alcohol markers.

Now...I am going to huddle..football style...with Gary...
confirm our plan of attack for the remaining 50 bins that need to be sorted etc for the sale...
and get this job DONE.

If you live in the NYC.. Long Island...New Jersey...Connecticut...Westchester area
take a ride and visit us at the garage sale next weekend.
I promise you some crazy & amazing bargains.

Have a great Saturday, my crafty friends!
Michelle.