Friday, March 14, 2008

A Challenge.... and how I did it!

It's Friday! TGIF! Which means.... drum roll please... time for another Stamp Simply Challenge courtesy of the lovely and talented Sharon Johnson (applause welcome)!

This week her challenge is to paper pierce. In her words, "anyway, anyhow, anywhere, anything goes -- from simple piercing around a scallop edge, or a simple straight line or corner, to something ornate with a fancy Ornare type template -- as long as we are poking holes in our paper -- LOL!!!" Ok, so that's easy enough right? What are you waiting for, get piercing!!!

To check out the details for her challenge... click HERE That's where you'll also find her fabulous creation!! LOVE the colors she used!

Dee Jackson also came up with a FABULOUS idea for paper piercing. When I saw her card, I actually thumped my head and said, "Now why didn't I think of that!" Check it out HERE!

I actually used a Lasting Impressions brass template for my paper piercing. I have a ton of old brass stencils that I bought probably 4 or 5 years ago that hardly ever see the light of day! Well, I am dragging them out now because I realized I can use them with my Wizard OR use them like I did here, for paper piercing templates!

I also did something else! I used this template to create a mask so that I could sponge ink in the center of my piercing. So, I ran the template through my Wizard, folded it in half and then cut along the inside line leaving about 1/2 inch.


What I have now... is a mask! I tacked it down with some post-it notes and then sponged in some Antique Paper Distress Ink in the center.


Lift off the mask and PRESTO.... this is what you've got!


From there, I inked up my Hero Arts flower with two shades of red marker and two shades of green marker to give it some dimension. I huffed and stamped! I did leave the mask over my main piece of paper when I stamped because I didn't want the stem of my flower to go below the inked up part of my paper pierced piece. I matted it onto a piece of Stardream Gold paper, wrapped it with some gold embroidery floss, and matted it on a 4 by 5-1/4" piece of red that had been accented with a kind of Harlequin stamp using Versamark ink. I matted the red piece on a piece of brown that had been edged with gold leaf pen. And then matted this whole thing onto a textured dark red card stock base. The sentiment is from Silhouette Blooms from Cornish Heritage Farms. I love this set! The words and flowers are so elegant! Before I attached a hot fix nail head onto my sentiment tag, I did use the ticket corner punch from Stampin' Up on all four corners. I attached my tag not with the thread but just by cheating with some foam tape!

Hope you find time to take part in the challenge! I'd love to see what you cook up!

Have a fab weekend!



19 comments:

Sharon (notimetostamp) said...

Oh my goodness gracious!!! You are way, way too clever!!! This is fabulous and what a wonderful tutorial you have created!!! Oh, what we can do with those old brass templates -- I must dig mine out as well!!! This is a fabuluos project -- thank you so much for sharing your talent!!!

Anonymous said...

This is beautiful!! Great tutorial too:)
Dee

Penny said...

Clever or what eh? I love the card! You are so right about the brass stencils - I came across one the other day with holes in a pattern and thought oh yes, poking holes has come back into fashion now and look, I had this template all along and never used it!

Penny said...

p.s. I am just about to blog and link to your faux suede tutorial :)

Anonymous said...

what an awesome idea!! I'm gonna have to give that a try! you smart cookie you!

Deb Wood said...

Such a great idea and very beautiful card!!

Janine said...

Oh WOW !! This is just so so pretty!! And thanks for the information! Out come all those stencils!!
Have a great weekend.

Joan Fricker said...

I love your card. Thank you so much for the tutorial. It so helps to see how things are done.

I enjoyed reading your blog. Thanks to Sharon for sharing the links.

Joan

Ruth M said...

Thanks for the reminder about brass stencils - I'm off to check my Lasting Impressions stash! Great info on how to create the mask - clever! Great card, thanks Julie!

Jennifer Buck said...

So very pretty! I love the paper piercing. Beautiful! Hope you are having a great day! :)

Heather said...

Great tutorial and I love the card!

Carolyn King said...

Wow....beautiful. LOVE your creative masking and piercing. Awesome card!

Sheila D said...

Absolutely gorgeous! I'm definitely going to have to try this now.

NancyK said...

Julie - this is fabulous not only did you do paper piercing but love how you masked that great shape! TFS

Anonymous said...

Julie, this is gorgeous! Love the mask with the paper piercing..so beautiful!

I'm tool challenged and entirely out of date. What is a Wizard, and what does it do to the brass templates? I have lots of brass templates...should I need a Wizard like I need everything else?

Anonymous said...

I love stopping over to see what great cards you have come up with. Very Clever, The card is gorgeous! TFS

Annapurna said...

Nice work! You make everything look so easy.

Juanita B said...

WOW, how creative! Your card is absolutely BEAUTIFUL, TFS.

dasimonds said...

Great Job!!
very clever...You have just convinced me to dig out all my
Brass templates too.
Thank you for sharing this info.