Three Little Words & Bird Punch card

I am in love with Stampin' Up's new 2 Step Bird Punch! It's irresistible. I had this idea that I wanted to use it both as a punch and also a stencil, so that is what I did.

Supplies:
Stamps - Three Little Words
Paper - Whisper White, Real Red, Pretty in Pink card stock; Sending Love specialty paper
Ink - Taken with Teal, Real Red, Basic Black
Other - Chocolate Chip and Basic Black Stampin' Write markers; 2 step bird punch; Scallop Trim border and corner punches; cloud template (home made), stampin dimensionals

• First I freehand drew the fence on a 6.25" x 4.25" piece of Whisper White card stock. The fence was not hard, I just made sure to include plenty of streaks to give it a wood-grained texture.
• Next I used my 2 step bird punch on Real Red card stock, and set the shapes aside.
• I then used the voids left in the Real Red scrap paper as a stencil. I sponged the three plain birds. Hint: be sure to use post-it notes to cover over the other holes the punch makes and a generous area around where you are sponging. Post-it sticky keeps the stencil in place, as well as masking where you don't want ink.
• I placed the punched-out wing shape to position the wing on the plain birds, then put the stencil of the wing over that, then removed the punched-out wing. I then sponged more Real Red to achieve the two-toned look on the plain birds. Then I added eyes and feet with my black marker.
• Next I punched more bird shapes out of post-it notes, and stuck them on my existing birds to act as masks. I then used my hand-made cloud template and sponged the clouds everywhere.
• I stuck down the Real Red punched-out bird in the center standing on a fencepost and drew feet for him. I then punched another bird out of Sending Love paper and popped that up on a dimensional directly on top, and attached the wing. The popped-up bird on top of the red bird gives it a nice look, even if you can't see it in the photo. (Now I wish I had chosen a better stretch of DSP to punch my bird out of, I don't like the pattern on the bird anymore.)
• Lastly I stamped the sentiment. (Sadly, after everything else had gone so well, the sentiment stamped badly leaving some extra lines. I couldn't resist - I used Picasa's retouch feature to remove them from this photo.)
• To finish off the card I matted the art layer on a border-punched red layer and a pink layer. Then for the card base I recycled the 5x7 "sheet count" card which comes as a packing list with all professionally printed cards from My Digital Studio. If you ever ordered professionally printed cards, you'll know what I'm referring to.

I know I was a little vague on some of those steps - contact me if you have any questions, or if you'd like to order any of these supplies.

Charly Bratt
CharlysInkLink@gmail.com
http://www.charlysinklink.stampinup.net/