Exciting News and Happy World Card Making Day!

First off Happy World Card Making Day everyone!! Isn't it great that card makers have their own special day! I hope you all get to spend some time creating today. This is such a big day at my house. I even get flowers from my husband! 

Now the exciting news! I have been invited to join the Just Us Girls Challenge Blog design team!! Every Saturday they have a different challenge. Here is the monthly schedule:

 Week 1: Sketch

        Week 2: Technique

Week 3: Color

                  Week 4: Photo Inspiration

        Week 5: Wild Card

This week is a sketch challenge. I took a few liberties with the sketch. I hope I don't get booted off the team for bucking the system right from the start. There is a reason for my madness, that I hope will put me back in my teams good graces.

It seems a wee birdie told me it is Just Us Girls (JUGS for those in the know:)) 4th birthday. So for my first challenge card, I knew it had to be a birthday card and I had to have 4 macaroons. One for each year! Am I forgiven girls? 

I used a great set from Avery Elle called Bonjour. Oh the possibilities!

This card features some tips and techniques that i find myself using over and over again. Have you ever pulled a sentiment from your stash, to find it does't fit the space you have? If you have acrylic stamps, do what I do. Just carefully cut up the sentiments into individual words and rearrange them to fit your card. I have been doing this for years. it makes your sentiments much more versatile.

Here is the original saying. (sorry for bad photo.)

Here it is cut up. as you can see from my card, I made the saying into one line.

My technique is making your own baker's twine. How often do you make a card and you don't have any twine to match your card? This used to happen to me all the time. I adapted this technique to make my own from this video.

  

I start with plain baker's twine and a piece of chipboard 3 inches wide. The length doesn't matter.  I put a notch at the beginning and the end to hold the twine and I wrap it around the chip board.

Next using any kind of permanent marker, color diagonal stripes over the twine. put on several layers of 

color, make sure you cover both sides of the chipboard.

Unwrap the twine and you have your own custom baker's twine.

Please join us at JUGS to celebrate their birthday and World Card Making Day! Our sponsor this week is A Walk Down Memory Lane. they will be offering a $15.00 gift certificate.