Trodat Marking Products Inc. has acquired M&R Marking Systems Inc.

Blogger Butterfly Gail has a use for luncheon serving trays: rubber stamp storage.

A serving tray can also work well for catching scraps as you trim or punch papers, stamps and fabric. Or the backing paper of stickers and labels and embellishments. Just set the tray beneath your hands and scissors and catch the excess. Simply dump (or recycle) when you’re done. It makes clean-up a breeze!

Also good for making sure beads and other spherical items don’t roll away.

In a pinch, you can also use the bottom of a brown paper grocery bag. Just trim from about 1/2″ to 1″ from the bottom, and you have a disposable (or recyclable) “tray” to catch your trimmings.

You can find a selection of modern and retro serving trays on eBay. Find one that suits you. Or, find a set.

Rubber stamping can be great, productive fun. Once you get in “the zone,” it can even be therapeutic. Stamping Therapy, as blogger Jenn D titled her most recent blog entry.

Just don’t overdue it, or you can fall into “craft overload,” as blogger Little Ol’ Me calls it.

You’ve got to find the right balance. Rubber stamping can be something you do alone or with family or friends. Depends on what you enjoy the most, as well as whether your friends and family enjoy it too!

Either way, it can take your mind off the worries of the day. Just ink and stamp, stamp and ink. Snip, snip. Not sure what sound glue would make, but imagine that at this point. Snip, snip. Punch, punch, punch. And, at this point, I’d rather be stamping than writing…

Skye Hawk, NAR Certified REPA has a list of some creative ways to use your business card.

Of course, we like #10, which can include embellishing them with rubber stamps. Or, be hip, and say you’re pimping your cards with rubber stamps.

Kudos and boos to blogger Southern Beale for first correctly referring to a politician as a “rubber-stamp” and then using “rubber stamp” in the very next sentence to describe them in her post: “Watergate Tapes: Thompson Was Nixon’s Mole.” It’s like a roller coaster of emotions. First excitement and then disappointment.

Kathy Cano Murillo of the Arizona Republic has a great article on decorating your luggage. In addition to rubber stamps, you can use foam stamps, paint, stencils and other materials.

It can be a great project for the whole family!

Source: “Painted-on decorations give luggage a snazzy new look”
The Honolulu Advertiser, July 7, 2007

Blogger helen7haden has an excellent post on planning and organizing your scrapbooking needs, include whether or not you want to be a “documenter” or a “scrapper.” Personally, I prefer the term “archivist” over documenter. Anyway, the post is an excellent one with a lot of useful information: “Archiving Our Families.”

My preference for scrapbooking is using standard 8-1/2″ x 11″ paper (non-U.S. readers should use the standard size in their country). You can use standard 3-ring binders and decorate them anyway you like. You can even get the ones with the see-through covers that let you slip in your own front and back covers and spine.

The advantage of using standard sized paper is that you can get copies made easily as well as scan the pages into your computer more easily. What happens when it is time to pass the scrapbook down to the next generation and more than one person wants it? (And, more than one person should have a copy in order to maintain your family memories.)

By using standard size paper, you can make extra copies or scan them into the computer and eMail or save them to CD or DVD. If you save your scrapbook in multiple ways, there are more opportunities for it to survive into the future.

Happy Fourth of July!

Here’s a great idea: “learn more about Ohio” while searching for rubber stamps. Letterboxing is a fun, and sometimes challenging!, activity that can also be an enjoyable learning experience. It began in England, and has now spread to North America.

It can be a worthwhile family activity, or something to do with a friend or by yourself.

Here’s a link to a source of all things copyright: “U.S. Copyright Office - Law and Policy” Well, maybe not all things, but pretty comprehensive regardless. And, that’s U.S. copyright; international readers, your mileage may vary.

Fortunately, titles are not protected by copyright, or we’d be in trouble for pilfering blogger quinncreative’s title: “Living (Happily) With Copyright” (As a side note, slogans and phrases are not generally copyrightable either, though there have been some exceptions to that.)

At any rate, quinncreative has a republished (her own) article (link above, obviously) that provides a brief introduction to copyright. Also includes a short list of other sites with additional information.

Despite the efforts of many people online, there are still large numbers of people that think anything they find on the Internet is free for the taking.

Rubber stampers familiar with the term “angel company” are generally more aware of copyright than the general populace, but it’s still a good idea to read about copyright now and again just to refresh your memory. And, don’t forget to share the knowledge with your friends!