faux jewels

Before I go any further, I'd like to say that I didn't come up with this idea. This was a tip that was offered up on the Gingerwood stamping forum by Karen Lingel. I just thought it was a nifty idea and wanted to share what I did with it.

Here's how it works. You take a round paper punch and punch 1/4 inch circles out of adhesive holographic paper. You could do 1/8 inch circles or bigger ones, too. That's it! The holographic design makes it look like those 3D adhesive jewels that are so popular as card bling right now. The best part is that they're flat and won't require any extra padding or postage when mailing.

Here are some pics.


I used the clear gel glue and the Stickles to add some sparkle and dimension. I actually like them better plain, in retrospect. I used the blue holographic paper because that happened to be what I had on hand. I have the silver stuff somewhere, but I found this first.


This is just a close up of my first attempts at these. They're fun, but they could still use a little something. I decided that what was needed was some dimension. But how? I was pondering this last night when my eye landed on some packaging plastic that someone had left on the counter after opening something up. AHA! I guess sometimes it's a good thing that people don't always throw their trash away. Yeah, right. One time now it's been helpful. ;-)

So, this morning I did what any good crafter would do and rummaged through my trash for a nice pristine piece of transparent plastic. The one that I'd seen last night was mangled. I cut a piece and adhered the blue holographic strip to it. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the back was.... silver!


That's the silver side showing through the plastic.


And here are the circles that I punched out using my Crop-a-Dile. I haven't tried this with a regular punch. A regular one might not add quite so much bend to the circles, or at least the bending might be more symmetrical. Don't know if it'd punch through the plastic though. They do flatten out with a little pressure using a stylus or bone folder. I hope you can see that they catch the light and do look like those little adhesive jewels.


They really are flat though. Here they are from a different angle.

And here's a card with them.


The stamps are by Inkadinkado and stamped using Memento dye ink. The embossing was done with the Floral Fantasy Cuttlebug A2 embossing folder. The flowers are Primas with Diamond Stickle centers. The bling below the sentiment are the faux jewels, silver side up.

I just love ideas like this. Something so simple to do, with items that a crafter probably has on hand already, and with a very practical application.