Use Your Stash: Punches

Diane from My Time To Craft and it's time to dig out those punches you have hiding in the back of the craft drawer and find some new uses for them. Today I discovered that clam shell punches make great petals.

So in honor of Mother's Day this Sunday, here's a rose for all you moms.

A stack of nicer paper place mats from a local restaurant happened my way this week and I figured I could do something with them. Think stronger than your typical paper place mat with a nice linen texture. It's still pretty thin and didn't like my newer Cricut mat, so I pulled out the clam shell punch and it worked perfectly.

You can see a bit of the texture in this photo.

I then just started  rolling them to create the center and layering  the outer petals, adding a little water along the way to curl them. I loved working with this paper because it would quickly absorb the water I brushed on and would dry fairly quickly as well.