Punch Drunk

I went to JoAnn's this past Friday in small hopes of finding We R Memory Keepers brand new Lucky 8 punches.  I hoped there might be just one.  Foolish faith.

While over in their Fiskars punch area I happened to see a clearance tag on a small corner punch.  Lacking a goodly supply of these, I snatched it up.  The punch was originally listed at $12.00, but was marked down to $2.98.  WOW!  What a deal.  Initially it appeared I'd come in too late in the sale to take advantage of other great deals after seeing so many of the arms with clearance tags empty.  Undeterred,  I began looking more closely at the clearance tags.  They didn't hang on the front of the arm, but each was pushed against the back wall.  The search was on!

In the end, I found: 1 regular shape punch, 2 small corner punches, 2 3-in-1 emboss plus punch, 1 4-in1 emboss and punch, 1 medium squeeze punch, and 3 different border and corner punch sets.  Oh!  And a Sizzix Original dye.  Over $150.00 retail value, I spent less than $50!  A 66% savings value!!!

In the past, I've hesitated over buying corner punches.  They just seemed so dog-gone expensive.  At the same time, I've also felt the loss of these tools, especially when matting photos.  Small rounding and large rounding was to the largest extent of photo and matting ability before now.  While nice, there's just so much creativity to be had.  Between the newly acquired tools, and the couple of other punches I owned, I now have the ability to create no less than 18 corner designs.  And that's before combining punches for extra depth.

And this is the way I've built a huge inventory in such a short time, by taking advantage of really great deals.  They almost always come in bulk of one tool or element.  If I buy one, and find others, I stock up.

There's still one of the WRMK Lucky 8 punches I really want, but the last purchase ate this month's remaining allowance.

Before ending the discussion of punches, I found posted somewhere a nifty tip about how to know whether a particular punch in the store is not already sitting in the closet, or punch bin, whichever applies.

For every punch bought, punch an index card with the new punch.  Each card then gets a general round punch so each card as acquired can be added to a opening/closure ring.  When heading out to a craft store, take the entire ring.  Then, when wondering whether the punch on the shelf is something already owned, all it takes is pulling out the ringed set and flipping through the punched cards

Punch Ring - Organization

I've taken this idea to a higher level and write the brand name and title of the demonstrated punch to make putting together the "supplies used" sheet easier to write up after the page or card creation.

(Sorry for the mess.  Actual scrapbook page creation in progress)