Care and Feeding of Your Stamps and Tools Tips
Read these 16 Care and Feeding of Your Stamps and Tools Tips tips to make your life smarter, better, faster and wiser. Each tip is approved by our Editors and created by expert writers so great we call them Gurus. LifeTips is the place to go when you need to know about Stamp tips and hundreds of other topics.
Store your Ink Pads Upside Down!
Store your ink pads upside-down, and you'll find that they are always moist and ready to work! Take care to store them flat, though, or you may find your ink has pooled to one side of the pad.
Try Baby Wipes
Alcohol-free baby wipes are the perfect cleaning idea for stamps. They have moisturizers in their solution that will also prolong the life of your rubber. Try taking a new box of wipes and squeezing out all the excess moisture, then pouring a bottle of stamp cleaner over the stack. A box should last at least of few months.
Keeping track of your stamps
Buy a scrapbook or notebook and stamp images of your stamps. Write down the stamp company's name next to the image for reference. You can use this book when shopping so that you don't "double up" on stamps.
Sharpening Scissors and Punches
If you've been using decorative scissors or punches and find that they have become blunt, you can use kitchen foil to sharpen them. Just cut through a piece of foil a couple of times, and they will be sharpened. If you continue to have a problem you can also try cutting through fine sandpaper.
Sealing Your Wood Mounted Stamps
Many stampers choose to seal the wood around the rubber of their wood-mounted stamps. It isn't necessary, but many stampers prefer that their mounts maintain a pristine condition. Use a quick drying craft sealer or varnish. You can even use clear nail polish! Make sure that the sealer does not come in contact with the rubber, though.
Storing paper - pizza boxes!
If you have trouble keeping your paper supplies under control and finding storage for it all, then you could try visiting your local pizza place! Unused pizza boxes make great storage containers for paper and card.
Page Sage Software for Rubberstampers
You can now buy a great computer program which is designed to help you keep track of your stamps. The name is Page Sage and you can have a look at it online at their website.
Scissors and punches that stick?
If you love using decorative scissors and punches, but are finding that they are "sticking" when cutting, just cut through a piece of waxed paper a couple of times. This will lubricate the blades and make your cutting easier.
Storing Your Pens
If you buy or already own felttip markers the best way to store them is horizontally, so that the ink is evenly distributed in the pen barrel. A simple pencil case will do this job nicely.
Storing Your Wood Mounted Stamps
Stamps can be stackeded in shallow drawers (such as Iris carts), but no more than two or three stamps deep! Store them face down and make sure that the largest stamp is on the bottom to ensure that each stamp lies flat and is protected from damage.
How to Clean Permanent Ink Off Stamps
While dye inks can be cleaned off your stamps with water, cleaning of permanent inks from your stamps requires the use of cleaning solvents made especially for that purpose. You'll find stamp cleaning fluids at most every supplier.
Repairing wood-mounted stamps
Sometimes you will find that you will "love" a stamp so much that the rubber will come away from the wood mount. In most cases all you need to do is stick it back on with a small dot of Super Glue (be careful handling this stuff!). If the sponge layer has degraded you can usually buy more sponge at your local store or at many online stores.
Avoid Sun!
Sunlight will degrade and harden your rubber stamps. Stamps should be stored cool, dry place, away from direct sunlight.
How to Clean Water-based Ink Off Stamps
When you've been using water-based ink, you can just clean it off with water! The best ways of doing this are to buy a special stamp cleaning pad (one brand of these is Stamp It) that you dampen with water. If you can't find one of these in your stamping shop, then just fold up a nice thick paper towel and dampen it with water. Place it on a plastic plate and clean you stamps by "patting" them onto the paper towel.
Storing your cards in plastic bags
Firstly, you want to make sure that store your cards in archival quality bags. That sounds like it`s going to expensive and difficult, but it`s not really. You just have to make sure that the bags you use are made from plastic in the "poly" family. That is, bags made from polyethylene, polypropolene etc. They usually aren`t expensive at all, and you`ll be able to put your cards into them knowing that they will be safe from deterioration for a long time.
A couple of companies that sell bags suitable for cards are:
Bags Unlimited - they will send a free catalogue and you can place your order online.
Dandl Products - They sell boxes of bags suitable for greeting cards. The price I saw on here was $11 for a box of 1000!
Prolonging the Life of Your Ink Pads
To prolong the life of the ink in your stamp pads, store each pad in it's own zip-lock bag, making sure that you squeeze as much air as possible out of the bag before sealing.
