Elegant card, good for birthday, invite, thank you, mother's day or event get well soon.

here's a card I did recently that the design was taken from some parchment book. it looks elegant with some flowers and nice curves and dots.

 

Step by step on how to do Parchment box

Here are the step by step guide and photo showing how I did this lovely parchment box.

Step 1:

Find your design pattern, position your vellum paper and use masking tape to tape it down.

Step 2:

Trace the lines with emboss tool, i use #2 emboss tool for the line tracing.

Step 3:

Remove the pattern and re-trace the design to make the embossing more obvious. For area you wanted to fill in, like the border of the heart shape, flowers and leaves, you can use a bigger emboss tool (#4 or #5 emboss tool) to fill up the area. Control your pressure on the leaves so it will look like gradient. the area you increase pressure, it will be whiter. make sure you don't put too much pressure or the paper will tear.

Step 4:

flip over the paper to the outer box to use the needle perforating tools for the heart and the 5 needle pattern. this will be easier if you have the heart shape perforating needle and the flower pattern 5 needle perforating tool. if you don't have them, you can still use the 1 needle perforating tool to do it by placing the pattern paper below the vellum paper and poke the design accordingly.

Step 5:

If you use the shape needle (shape that is form from a lot of needles, like the heart shape perforating needle tool), you need to do it twice to have a nice obvious heart shape, if you poke too deep the first time, it's very difficult to remove the needle tool from the paper. you need to align the needle again to do the second round. I personally prefer to use the 1 needle perforating tool to do the second round for a much more nicer look. 

Step 6:

Use the #5 needle to poke around the top edge of the box like shown in the photo below. 

after you poke, hold the perforating needle tool and twist left and right to make the 4 holes at the side bigger

Step 7:

Use the 2 needle to poke around the edge of the box. To make sure you have event spacing between each dot, always aim 1 of the needle to the previously poked hole as guide and poke down the 2 needle so get the 2nd hold with the same spacing. 

Step 8:
Use the curve scissor to cut the edge. You just need to use the tip of the scissor, place it in 2 holes and lightly cut it. You should get the "v" looking edge. sometime it helps to twists your scissor slightly to 1 side just before you cut. You need some practice on this to get the hang of it. All cutting uses this technique.

Step 9:

The area where there's suppose to be a hold, use a pen knife to cut it out.

 Step 10:
For the inner heart shape area, with the help of the plate, use the outer side of the paper, poke the holes with #1 or #2 perforating needle tools following the pattern shown in A. Turn over the paper so you are using the inner box side to do the embossing of the dots. You can leave the design as it is after all the dots. or you can also choose to have a mixture design of dot and cut out as shown is step 11.

Step 11:

if you choose to have a mixture, you will have alternate of dot and cut out.  I use the outer box side to do the cutting. See red line shown below for where to cut.

     

Step 12:
Also at the outer box side, with the help of the plate again, poke the holes following the pattern shown in B on the 2 surface without the heart shape (i'll be referring this as surface B). you can sppe this up if you use the 4 needle perforating tool.

Step 13: 

Flip over to the inner box side and do the embossing. I use the #4 emboss tool. 

Step 14:

Remember to do the embossing for the heart shape too.

Step 15:

Flip to the outer box side, poke the heart shape either with the heart shape perforating needle or 2 needle and cut out the middle heart needle. I left out some of the dots on the surface B, just 2 rows alternate ones and cut them out too.

After you are done, just glue up the side of the box and fold it into a box. 

Step by Step on How to Create Parchment Card

I came across this simple design which i find it useful for quite some occasion so I decided to do it. Here are the step by step guide for this project:

Step 1: design on the pattern and get ready your vellum paper. In this project, I have make use of A5 size purple vellum and fold it into half to become a card. Identify and decide which area you wanted it to be outline, which area to be fill in white and which area will be perforating.

Step 2: Position the card inner cover on top of the pattern and tape down with masking tape to secure the positioning.  

Note 1: Emboss from the inner cover so it will look emboss on the from cover of the card.

Note 2: Do not use normal tape as it will tear the vellum paper when you try to remove it.

Step 3: Trace the design onto the vellum paper using the emboss tool. I use #2 emboss pen in this project.

Step 4: Remove the pattern paper and use a bigger emboss pen (i use #5 emboss pen) to fill in the area you wanted it to be white.  

Note: i always put a paper or card between my hand and the vellum paper as i my hand will become sweaty.

Step 5: Usually first round tracing, the design will not look so obvious and nice, use the smaller emboss pen to draw the edge and corner so it's more obvious.

Step 6: turn around the paper and perforate on the front cover of the card. in this project, I use the 5 needle flower.

Note: you do not need to poke the needle too deep as it will tear the paper when you try to remove the needle. 

Step 7: Poke your needle second time to make the holes more obvious. I usually like to do one round of all perforating and do a second round.

Step 8: Turn your paper to the inner cover and emboss the dot to make it more round and obvious.  

Step 9: Turn back to the front cover and poke diamond shape and extra 2 dots at the turning part of the pattern. In this project, i use the diamond 4 needle and 1 needle to do this.

Note: poke twice to avoid tearing the paper, first time lightly, second time deeper.

Step 10: Perforate the edge of the pattern using the 2 needle. always put your first needle into the previous second needle hole. this will make the hole bigger and also easier to adjust the distance. 

Step 11: Use the parchment scissor lightly place the 2 shape end into 2 holes and tilt the scissor a little then cut. It will cut out as a little triangle. 

Note: you might want to practice on the cutting before you actually do this. 

Step 12: the card is finish. i have a lacy pattern card now. I can decide to add wording to the empty area later when i need to use it. 

Step 13: i can choose to add color paper inside so i can have my message written in. 

Finally received my new advance tools set!!

It has been a few year's since my last post to this blog. I have been updating my facebook page but not here. Some friends has been asking me to update my blog too, I felt it is time to update this as well. Recently received my proper advance tool sets. love it so much and it's much cheaper compare to the Holland well known brand. one of these day, I will write a post and show you my old tools that I gather and made out of paper clay with sewing needles.



Happily labeling and arranging my new tools!!

here's a card I did with the draft design that came with the set. it looks difficult and fantastic, but I did it fairly fast, the only portion that take more time was the edge perforating and cutting, but seeing the result, I'll say it's worth it. I left the center empty for the time being so when I wanted to use the card for some special occasion, I just need to do the text embossing on it and it will be done in minutes!

can be made into 3D!

Parchment craft can be added into a 3D design like any other paper design. This a 3D star that I made for my niece. instead of drawing or painting on it, I have use parchment method to emboss the stars on it and perforating a heart shape on it. Perforating a hole on each side and tie a ribbon on it. Since it's made of paper, it's very light and I can hang up this palm size 3D star. 

The color on the star is the original color paper. it's the only piece I have which I bought from a book stall quite some years ago. I don't think I can find this paper again. But you can actually color the white vellum paper.

Color Paper to Choose

I usually do my card with 2 types of paper, one is the half transparent paper (some call it vellum paper, parchment paper, tracing paper....etc) which is where the design is done on. The other color paper is place inside as the inner paper to write personal message of the card.

here are the inner color paper available:
 

As for the vellum paper, usually is in white (non color). but I manage to find some colored ones too. it's very hard to get so I will use it very wisely. Currently these are the colors I have.





you can refer to my previous post, the Christmas bell and the love shapes card is the one using color transparent paper number 2 and 3 accordingly. The rest are the white (non color) vellum paper with different inner color paper.

Cards for different Occasions

There are plenty of possibility that you can make use of parchment craft, just like any other hand made cards. It's the design that you need. What's good and easy for ding parchment craft is that you do not need to know drawing well, you just trace!! So it's easy and anyone can do it.  Found a nice design? trace it and make it into parchment card.

 

Some design are more generic and for some, one look you can tell what occasion it's for. There are also some design that can become the frame, and you can change the text in the center to make it suitable for different occasion. Don't be scare to explore around.

 

Here are some sample design taken from books on different occasions usage:

 

Christmas card
 

Valentine or Wedding card

Multipurpose card - the design is generic and can be use as birthday card, get well soon card, Thank you card....etc



Birthday card - the text in the center can be change to other occasion that you want to use it for.
 

Mother's Day card

 



Sample Cards I Made

Here are some horoscope cards I made.

they are all A5 size transparent paper fold into half.

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horoscope cards

They go very well with color paper to make into birthday cards.