Stash Busting Series Part 2: Paper Prep

Welcome to the second post in my stash busting series! Today I am going to talk all about prepping your paper. How many times do you buy a beautiful paper pad or page kit with the intention of using it on the perfect project and then it just sits. Maybe you feel it's too pretty to cut into or you're just not sure exactly what to use it for. Before you can start cutting into your paper you need identify what type of projects you regularly make. For me it is Project Life Albums, Traveler's Notebook Layouts, and sometimes 12x12 or smaller layouts. Once I can do that I can begin to go through my paper pad.  

I frequently use page kits in my scrapbooking. This is Family Ties from Photo Play.

The first thing I will do is go through the papers and see if there are any cut aparts. If so I will do just that and cut them apart. This kit came with 8 pages of cut aparts. Many of them in 4x6 and 3x4 sizes which if just perfect for my Project Life Album. 

So what if you have a kit or a paper pad that doesn't have cut aparts? This is a very old Baby Mine kit from Fancy Pants that didn't come with any cut aparts. 

First I will go through and pull out any papers that I probably don't want to cut into. This sheet already has a nice scene on it that I wouldn't want to ruin by cutting it smaller. These types of papers I will save for when I feel like doing 12x12 lyouts. 

I did find these papers in the kit that I could fussy cut.

I don't really have a purpose ahead of time for this kit so I am just going to cut the rest of the patterned papers into 4x6 and 3x4 sizes since that is most likely where they will be used.

This is a bin I got at Wal-mart for a little less than a dollar and it fits my Project Life cards perfectly.

Here are some other cards that I cut from the Simple Stories Faith line that again are siting in my Project Life bin ready and waiting to be used.

For me cutting my papers seems like such a daunting and quite frankly boring task. When I sit down to do Project Life or a layout in my traveler's notebook I want to play with my supplies, not waste time cutting papers. It may seem minor but for me it is a huge game changer to have my papers ready ahead of time.

I had intended the next post in this series to be about making a kit from your own supplies however I am going to switch things up a bit. On Friday May 5th Bella Boulevard is having a warehouse box sale and while the items are all coming from the same company I am expecting it to be a lot of randomness and I want to see how I can make that play in my kit building, So the next post is actually going to be on how you can stretch your scraps even further. I hope you are finding this series worth while and you continue to find inspiration and motivation to help you bust through your stash!