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If you were going to reorganize.....

mary kate said:
I also use a Store/Designer/Kit file system, but with a few quirks/modifications based on how I actually scrap. Within the folders of my most-used TLP designers, I also have some theme-y subfolders: for FJD, for example, I organize kits under Spring; Summer; Fall; Winter; Heritage; Children/Teens; and etc. And I also have some themed folders for TLP designers overall (Christmas, arranged by year, and then by designer/kit; Styles; TLP Collabs; Mixed Media). And I also have an all-stores/all-designers Scrapping Tools folder, with Stitching; Fasteners; Cut-outs; Scallops and Trims; Page Masks; and several other subfolders.
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Ooh that could be a good way too as it doesn’t rely on a very temperamental program that likes to crash and lose all my tagging time and time again plus it could kind of work with the way I scrap as well.
 
Aerobigirl said:
If something is discontinued, I retitle the kit preview and the kit so it starts with the letter Z, keeping the items in the folder but sorting them down to the bottom of the alphabet.
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Glad to know someone else does the "z" for retired kits. I rename both the previews and the kit folder with "z-" so it sorts to the end in both Windows and Picasa. Except Kristen Aagard. I have to use "zz-" for the few items that are retired since I have her kit Zoo Day and z- sorts before Zoo.
 
No use Thai g this out again - I concur!!!

LoveItScrapIt said:
I think true organizers are dedicated to doing this "all the time" I do that all day in my physical life. My brain works that way, but I refuse to spend time tagging products, when a basic word search fulfills 90% of my needs to find what I want. I've tried many suggestions over the years and I'll start with great intentions but ultimately, I needed to find what would work for my brain.

I keep shops separate. Then each designer in the shop inside that folder. I keep each product inside of the designer's folder.
Most designers name their elements which is usually the only things I'm really hunting for, IF I go hunting at all. I tend to stick with one kit 95% of the time, if I venture out, then it's usually for minor things like a button, or a certain flower etc.

It's pretty easy to just search "butterfly" or "button" inside of the Shops folder and come up with enough options.


I've found in the 13 years I've been doing this that I just want to scrap. I've learned to substitute things if I can't find something or it's taking too long. I think sometimes we get too caught up in the mechanics of a hobby and get inside our heads to the point we're not actually partaking in said hobby or enjoying it enough. I know I used to stress over a lot of things like organizing, or what programs to use, how to name things, etc...and I just decided one day I was done with all of that and have trained myself to get back to the basics like when I loved art class in school. Just create.

Sorry for the off tangent....
I say all that to say sometimes we have to "find" our own way. We can try everyone else's and they just don't fit us.
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littlekiwi said:
I know previously I’ve gone to the level of tagging store/designer, MOC, BYOC (I think I may have changed that one to just current BYOC until the end of each month) as well as the rest so I was burnt out by constantly tagging. This time I’m wanting to get to a level that is enough tagging for it to make sense to my scrapbooking brain but not so much that a) I become overwhelmed and b) I end up giving up
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If you are storing your kits the way most of us do:
Store > Designer > Kit name (I think you said that's how your files are?)
then definitely drop the store name and designer tags. You can tell ACDSee to only search a certain folder (TLP) or a certain Designer folder (Just Jaimee) and then search for button or whatever.

dawnmarch said:
-For MOC purposes, I would tag by store because ACDSee lets you filter by two things so then I can just look at previews for TLP products. This is easy because you can easily tag whole folders

-then I would tag all previews so that I could look through them easily.
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Yes to tagging previews! To Justine's (@bellbird ) comment about looking for alphas, I tag the alpha preview "Alpha". I don't think I mentioned that in my previous comment because I forgot. So, I pull up the tag Alpha and I can see all the alphas without seeing all 26 letters, plus numbers and special characters. I was always trying to remember where that cute stamped alpha, or dot alpha or whatever was, and I couldn't always find it in the store because it might not be named the silly name I called it.
 
Here's a thought for you, try searching ACDSee the way you would for an item. Like button or flair or paper. See if it returns what you want it to. That might help you realize how little tagging you actually need to do!

I know you buy a bunch of BYOC, and go back and use it. It might be worth it to you to create a system for BYOC that works so you can bring up the matching kits. Maybe even BYOC(month) so all the October over the years come up together, and all the January come up together? Or not worry about it if it's not something you want to worry about.

For MOC, what's the purpose of the tag? Just for current kits that work for MOC? It might be easier to do that one when you are in January. Like, I just used this kit, it's in the store, I'm gonna tag it so I know I checked it. Because that would be a lot of maintenance to go through each retirement kit and untag MOC.
 
@bestcee, replying to your last two posts in order here.

Yes I store my kits in Store > Designer > Kit for my main 3 stores then for the others it’s either Other Designers or Retired Designers > Designer > Kit.

The purpose of me tagging is so that I see what I have easier and in a way have less options since I have over 200gb of supplies. Relying on visual history doesn’t 100% work because some stuff was purchased through NSD/DSD deals or through computer changes/data losses I don’t have it anymore.

BYOC tagging really only matters to me occasionally to be fair, mainly if I am doing the BYOC challenge here. Eg: October 2022 BYOC probably wouldn’t get tagged because I only bought an alpha set

the MOC tag is literally so that I start with what I know is MOC compliant and can narrow down options before I start scrapping.
 
littlekiwi said:
The purpose of me tagging is so that I see what I have easier and in a way have less options since I have over 200gb of supplies. Relying on visual history doesn’t 100% work because some stuff was purchased through NSD/DSD deals or through computer changes/data losses I don’t have it anymore.
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I totally get this! It's why I tag the amount that I do. In ACDSee, try searching for a button in the Lilypad folder, and then try narrowing it down to Just Jaimee's folder (I know you have a ton of her stuff!) on your computer and see if it gives you enough results to work with. If it does, you'll know you don't have to tag every button. If it doesn't, then you have a project for another day! I think that might help you see how ACDSee will help you narrow down the options. It'll also give you an idea of whether you want to specifically search one designers folder, or if that's too limiting and you need the store folder. I hope that makes sense!

For example, in my stash I have 190 buttons in Just Jaimee's folder. That's plenty for me to choose from. My TLP folder on the other hand, has 2253 items labeled as buttons. That's overwhelming! And a ton of buttons! If you aren't sure how to search this way, let me know! I'll give you the step by step.
upload_2022-10-13_23-50-5.png


For MOC, I do rely on Visual History, because it's a good place to start looking at kits since they are in the store. I understand your thoughts on data loss, and NSD/DSD deals though. It might be a good place to start with your MOC tag still? You could pull up your Visual History, and look to see if you have the kit in ACDSee, and throw the MOC tag on it. If you don't have the kit, move on to the next one?

And yeah, if you don't go back to BYOC as a 'kit' then totally ignore my BYOC suggestion. That won't work for you!
 
I’ve become a fairly minimal tagger. I’m hooked on Lightroom. I just tag the previews. if there are separate previews for paper and elements, I tag them as such (also alphas) Sometimes I’ll look through the element previews with them pretty big and then flag, or put the previews in a quick collection. Once I’m working on the layout I can go back to those previews, and then get to the full kit quickly to pull the items that caught my eye when reviewing the previews.

I do keep a folder that is “new stuff” as a sub folder under my main stash. Eventually those items get moved to designer folders.

As for BYOC, I have changed. I used to tag BYOCs, but I rarely go back to it as a “kit”, so I keep them in the current month BYOC folder in case I get to the challenge, then they just go to designer folder. If I ever want to find coordinating kits, I use the store BYOC menu.

I guess these are the next 2 things I might want to tweak:

I’d love to figure out a way to be able to organize word strips, journaled sayings and such, but lately I’ve just been using those element previews, or searches for strip, journal, or word. But that can be overwhelming.

and I’m not sure why I buy more paper because almost all my layouts start with a simple white or off white background. I guess I’m just addicted to hoarding digi supplies. I really should create a favorites for these.
 
I might be of no help here because I'm not a tagger (tried it once, but it gave me anxiety so I stopped).

I just want to share that throughout the years I've been scrapping (since 2008), what has really helped me to enjoy scrapping is to let go of the old stuff and use the new stuff. This means that products that are purchased more than 4-5 years ago would sit in my external backup drive, while newly-purchased ones would sit in my scrapping external drive. Yes, I have 2 externals. One is for super old files that I might not need immediately, but would probably need one day (I call this my 'backup' drive), and another one is dedicated to everything scrapping (kits, layouts, photos to scrap, etc). One exception is if an old product is a fave or staple of my style, then it'll go into the scrapping external drive. But there's only a handful of them, not too many.

Another thing I do is to keep things simple. Go with my heart instead of my head. Meaning that I just use whatever's available and try not to stress too much if I can't find a specific paper or element or alpha.

I hope you'll find a way that's works for you!
 
elseepe said:
I really should create a favorites for these.
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Yes to this! I have a Favourites folder as well where I have subfolders there for Kits, Individual papers, Elements, etc. I try to limit what I add here to make it not overwhelming and so I could actually find what I need.
 
littlekiwi said:
Ooh that could be a good way too as it doesn’t rely on a very temperamental program that likes to crash and lose all my tagging time and time again plus it could kind of work with the way I scrap as well.
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I have found ACDSee to be more stable in recent years but I know you have had issues with it and I would be tempted to give it up if it crashed as much as it used to for me. On the other hand, I do use it in part because I like viewing my scrapbook stash on a different program than my photos (which I view usually through Adobe Bridge) -- that way I can see both at the same time to compare colors.
 
elseepe said:
I really should create a favorites for thes
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non-tagging question - file storage
on idea of favorites, would you put whole kit in, or shortcut to kit, or favorite individual element, staple, good looking dollies, etc?
 
Cath_ said:
non-tagging question - file storage
on idea of favorites, would you put whole kit in, or shortcut to kit, or favorite individual element, staple, good looking dollies, etc?
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I use Lightroom for organizing. Since I’m specifically targeting papers, I’d either create a tag or a collection. The collection does not physically move the file.
 
Cath_ said:
non-tagging question - file storage
on idea of favorites, would you put whole kit in, or shortcut to kit, or favorite individual element, staple, good looking dollies, etc?
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Both. I have a favorite folder for favorite kits. And I'll throw a preview in that if I come back to a lot a ton. But, I don't do that as much because I'm trying to use more of my stash.

I have a basics tag that I use to tag certain things. Like a favorite staple or enamel dot. But, I told myself no more than 2 of each item in the basics folder or it defeats the purpose. So, I have 2 staples (2 straight, 1 crossed), etc. If I want to add another staple, I have to let go of one of the first ones. With that caveat, I do have a preview of a white paper pack and a black paper pack tagged. The idea of my basics is if I'm in a hurry, I can throw together a layout using just those items. They are also favorite items of mine. I participate in layout a day, so sometimes I'm close to the end of the day and need a quick layout. You could use favorite instead of basic as a tag.

Before I had a tagging system, I had a favorite folder. I would copy and paste and item from a kit into the favorite folder. The reasoning was I didn't want to lost the item from the original kit. And if I was tired of an item in the kit I could delete it, and it would still be stored in the kit.
 
I am making slow progress towards an organized scrap stash. A few days ago I unzipped all of my downloads from the past kind of 6 months (yes it was bad but health dictated doing it in stages), today I am collating kits into their folders and popping them in their homes. Still haven't fully decided how I'm going to organize yet as its a huge job that quite frankly is overwhelming me
 
Rather than starting a new thread (only cause its been discovered while sorting my stash)

It seems I am drawn to kits with the same kind of themes or items in them to the point I have an abundance of some of them. How do you either a) stop buying such similar kits and/or b) use some of the more abandoned kits? I have a tendancy to use the same kits over and over again or buy more when I already have a huge stash?

FYI: Yes I do wishlist first for the most part and only really buy during sales but its like I don't even consider what I might already have
 
I had to keep telling myself I need to not use the same kits all the time. That is why I set up my previews in Bridge and went through the process of figuring out which kits have been used. My trusty tracking spreadsheet I've used since 2008 really came in handy for that.

I did find that I have a lot of kits for autumn but I do tend to take a lot of photos in the autumn months. I'm just drawn to the beauty of the changing leaves. But I did find that there are some I haven't used so my goal is to use them for my October Daily project that is highlighting autumn in Ohio. And, I have a lot of Christmas kits. But these days Christmas is not a big holiday gathering for me. Although with my cousin sharing photos of their holiday celebrations and me making photo books for them, I have been able to use those kits.

So now that I have Bridge set up when I'm scrapping something, I will do a search for a kit that fits whatever theme I'm working on. I can easily see if there are any kits I haven't used. If there are, I will use them. If not, I'll either search for a different keyword or use something I've already used. I've also started to think outside the box as well by using theme kits for something entirely not related to the theme.

Some themes though it isn't easy to not use kits over and over. I scrap a lot of dog photos. I have a lot of dog kits. I think there is only one or two that I haven't used so the next time I do dog photos, I'll try to use them.

But it all came down to a mindset. If I didn't change that, I'd still be scrapping with the same kits all the time.
 
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