In this new, limited blog series, “20 Ways to Collect While Stuck at Home,” we offer ideas for enjoying your collection at times when a standard hobby experience is not possible. Illness, financial constraints, or any number of factors might temporarily keep collectors from participating as they normally would, but that does not mean that their hobby needs to be put on hold.
There are a lot of different ways for collectors to be productive and enjoy the hobby while they are stuck at home. Cleaning your hobby space might not be the most exciting thing in the world, but there is little doubt that organization is a benefit to your collecting experience.
Organization Helps
It really is easy for our collections to get disorganized. We buy large groups of cards and take a long time to sort them into our sets. We buy multiple items in a short amount of time and fail to even take them out of the packing materials. We get busy with our family or professional lives and completely ignore the hobby for a bit of time. We get home from a show with a stack of new cards for a set, but don’t take the time to check them off our want lists.
Really, it happens to us all. But if we don’t take the time to address our mess, then it stacks up and things can get quickly out of hand. I mean, who hasn’t accidentally purchased a second copy of a card because we didn’t bother to mark it off our lists the first time? I know that I have.
What To Do
The steps you take and manner in which you get organized is based on your own situation, but here are a number of ideas for getting your collecting space better organized.
- Update your want lists
- Scan cards for your digital archive
- Sort stacks of recent purchase and put cards where they belong
- Purchase storage boxes
- Make labels for your boxes and binders
- Clean out the drawer/space where you store card savers, top loaders, sheets and other supplies
- Clean all cards off your desk
- Cull the unwanted items from your collection and prepare to sell them
- Update your PSA Set Registry listings
It’s a Marathon, Not a Sprint
The cleaning of your hobby space doesn’t have to be done overnight, but it also should not be ignored. Depending on the size of your hobby area, you might break things up into individual tasks to complete over a week or longer. The key is to get started and not stop until the process is finished.
Once things are in top shape, stay on top of them so they don’t get out of hand again. Sort cards immediately after purchases. Mark things off your want lists as soon as you get them. Add new items to your inventory lists right away. A little bit of effort following each purchase will make your hobby life much easier to manage than it has ever been before. And don’t we all want our hobbies to be a smooth part of our lives?
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