It's that time of year

The process of organizing my collection is an ongoing, year-round project for me. But I do more organizing during the last month of the year than at any other time.

During November and December, I start cataloging and boxing up sets from the current year. The sets that I don't ever plan to add to go in boxes first and those 2016 sets are already there. Left in stacks are 2016 sets that should grow at least a little during the gift-giving season. Packs of Archives, Heritage, Stadium Club and Allen & Ginter are all on the ol' Christmas want list.

But even those sets will likely be boxed up after the holiday; there is almost nothing from 2016 that I want to see in a binder.

Meanwhile, I am undergoing an extra bit of organization thanks to the supplies that Dave recently sent my way. He sent both binders and pages and I've already put one of the binders to work. Yesterday, I paged my 1976 SSPC set. It looks absolutely fantastic, and since there is no printing on the front of the cards in this set, I dispensed my usual double-bagging procedure so I can view the backs without taking them out.

I was positively delighted when these cards landed on the same page:

Can I tell you again how thrilled I am that I was a kid then?

Now all that binder needs is a card for the spine (I may have to rob the night card binder) and it's ready to go.

I haven't decided what will go in the other binder. The early candidates are the 2014 A&G set (still missing a few SPs that I cannot get myself to acquire) and the 2013 Opening Day set (booted out of another binder, because Opening Day? Who cares?). But I'll have to do some more thinking. 2013 Hometown Heroes is also in the running.

I'm probably more thrilled about the pages, especially the four-pocket ones. Because they have allowed me to finally get some oversized cards into pages.

Perhaps you remember this binder. I showed it once before. It houses most of my oversized stuff and several other oddballs.

Oddballs.

More oddballs.


In between are pages for oversized cards, now mostly four-pocket pages, thanks to Dave. Yay!

Many disc cards are notoriously uncooperative with pages. But the discs from the late '70s (Crane/Isaly's/Zip'z, etc., etc., etc) are perfect for four-pockets. There are much smaller discs, like the 1987 Jiffy Pops that are that awkward size that doesn't fit into 9-pocket and seems too small for 4-pocket. But I like discs living with their brothers so they're in four-pockets.

That's a lot of rounded-off '70s goodness.

The new four-pocket pages have finally allowed me to get all of the oversized Donruss Dodger cards from the mid-1980s in pages.

And I finally have all of my Dodgers postcards -- the Dodgers have so many -- stored in pages. They still need to be placed in order (I'm not going to bother figuring out when each was issued or I'll go insane).

1989 Baseball Talk cards are now finally in pages.

And some cards sent to me by fellow bloggers are finally in pages.

1964 Topps Giants now looking good in pages.

1970 Topps Super now in pages!!!! Super!

And -- this is a big one -- I picked up these Hall of Fame postcards during a visit to the Hall a long time ago and they've sat and sat and sat in boxes for decades. No more. They are all now in 4-pocket pages.

There are still plenty of oddball cards, large and small, that need storing help. I'm really hoping to land some tobacco pages soon, and there are larger cards that need 2-pocket and 1-pocket page attention.

And there are some items that I don't know if there are pages that will work.

1979 Topps Comics look great anywhere, but that's an awful lot of air.

Same deal with 1997 Wheaties.

I'm sure I'll do some research in the new year. The four-pocket pages will need some further organization and then I'll see what I have left and get cracking.

Organization never ends.

You got to love it.