Use Your Stash: Paper Stacks

You know you have  them. You know you love them  (they're so pretty). Time to start using them.
Yes, I'm talking about paper stacks and it may be blasphemy to some to crack their binding, but stacks have 2-3 of each page, so save one and use the rest. For me, DCWV stacks take up most of paper shelf, and why not, they're gorgeous and easy to find at Joann's and Michaels. For today's project, I will use several (yes, I said several) stacks. Will someone get my friend Allison some water as I think she probably fainted. :)

This year's theme for my son's school's auction is Moonlight Masquerade. I decided to play around with making masks (using the Chic & Scary cartridge) and tying them to "iron" gates (cut from Ornamental Iron).

Probably one of the best things about paper stacks is that you have an instant set of coordinating papers. Here are some examples:

DCWV Black Currant

DCWV Royal Garden

DCWV Lace & Linen

DCWV Luxury 

There are several other stacks like Immortal Love and Performance that would also work well for this project, but I don't have them and we're supposed to be using our stash. :) I'm particularly fond of the foil pages and those with just a bit of decoration in one corner or along the edge. For example:

If I lay out four masks along the edges on my Gypsy to grab a bit of the swirls on each, as such:

I end up with:

They are almost pretty enough to leave as is without further embellishment, but you could always add bling or feathers.

So, now I have all of these masks, what to do with them. I grab my Ornamental Iron cartridge and start making iron panels. I start with a lace sheet from Lace & Linen.

I then take the masks made from the same stack, punch holes in them where you would have ties, and stick skewers through them so I can figure out placement since I want them curved when they are on the grate.

Once I determine the layout I like, I replaced the skewer with curling ribbon, leaving a tale of several strands on the front of the mask to curl and tie it to the frame, ending up with:

I'll post more finished projects with the other masks as they get completed.