Just Us Girls Week 5 - Wild Card Challenge

Welcome to the 5th challenge presented by "Just Us Girls"!

Are you ready to get WILD for our challenge?! I sure hope so because we are officially hosting our 5th challenge this month...which means it's time for a WILD CARD! Okay, so maybe it's not that "wild" but it's going to be fun!

This week we challenge you to create a holiday card designed to present a photo! It can be any photo you choose whether it be family, pets, nature...it's your choice! The possibilities are endless!!

The idea for this challenge originally came from Alicia. I LOVED the concept so I asked her if I could use it for today's challenge, and thankfully, she agreed :) You don't HAVE to print a photo, or dig through a photo box or album to find that perfect shot in order to play along. You can pull your photo from a magazine if you want! We're just looking for some fab ideas for holiday cards designed to showcase a photo. If you want to use the black and white family pictures that are provided with new frames, go for it! LOL

With all of the diverse creativity you've shown us, I'm confident you will teach us a few things again this week! We learned sooo many different ways to create 3-D flowers last week, let's keep school in session for another!

We are truly amazed and humbled that so many fabulous designers are enjoying our challenges in the infancy of our blog! Thank YOU for supporting the JUGS (hee hee) and helping us to stay FRESH, FUN and always...CHIC!

How to play: Upload your project using this week's challenge to your online blog or public photo gallery. Leave a link that goes directly to your project in the Mr. Linky form at the end of this post. If you upload to online galleries, please also use the keyword or tag, JUGS5. After you post to Mr. Linky please leave a comment on this post.

Deadline to be considered for our weekly top pick called "Chic of the Week" is 9:00 PM EST on Thursday, November 5. All entries need to be posted to Mr. Linky by that time. "Chic of the Week" will be announced on the Just Us Girls blog post on Friday morning following the deadline. (You may still post to Mr. Linky after the deadline, your project just won't be considered for our "Chic of the Week" top pick.)

And now, "Just Us Girls" presents a little inspiration to get you started!

Dana

Kristin

Lisa

 Maria

Mona

Pam

Tracey

 Our Guest Designer

Tammy

EVERY participant is a WINNER this week!!! Just in case you missed that little tidbit in the challenge graphic above ;] If you play along this week and enter before the deadline, you will receive the "Happy Holidays" digital stamp and sentiment set shown in the challenge graphic. I created the lamp post and the two sentiments that use different fonts, and the amazingly gifted Tammy Hershberger wrote the title sentiment "Happy Holidays"!! Isn't her writing just PERFECT for papercrafting?! I wish I could market it!!

Special thanks to Chris Barr for helping me to digitize the lamp post!! He is an INCREDIBLY TALENTED Graphic Designer ;] ...without a blog, otherwise I would link him :[

After you play along and post your card in Mr. Linky before the deadline, email Just Us Girls and provide your email address and another link to your photo. One of us will respond with the digital Happy Holidays package just for you!


If you are not familiar with using digital stamps, check out the Pink Cat Studio Digi tutorials...they're perfect for newbies :O)

Beginners

Resizing and More

Okay, time for YOU to get started! Can't wait to see what you come up with :)

Chic of the Week #4 and blog candy winner!

Hello Ladies! ALL the girls & myself here at Just Us Girls would like to thank each & everyone of who could play along with us this week in the 3-D flower challenge! There were a whopping 90 FABULOUS entries this week & we currently have 167 friends :) While I would LOVE to showcase all of the entries, I have to narrow it down to just one winner! Before the announcement of the Chic of the Week, I would like to share with you the randomly selected winner of the blog candy tin & fleurettes as pictured below:
The winner is participant number.......42 Betty BentonCongratulations Betty! I will be contacting you soon to get your mailing address so I can mail your prize to you! Thank you so much for playing along with Just Us Girls!

Here is the moment you've all been waiting for.....After viewing & revisiting EVERY entry personally, I finalized my decision by selecting this GORGEOUS card created by LeAnne:LeAnne's card is very ELEGANT & CLASSY! The chiffon ribbon & rhinestone embellishments add such a RICH touch. Congratulations LeAnne! I will be sending you your winner's badge right away. We hope you'll wear it proudly :)

For pure inspiration & for your viewing pleasure, I highly recommend that everyone takes the time if you haven't already, to view all the entries! You may even learn a new technique!

REMEMBER: Saturday morning Just Us Girls will bring you an entirely new & exciting Wild Card Challenge! The lovely Kristin will be our Hostess & she will have a little something special to share with all who play! Thank you for all of your support this week!

Just Us Girls Week 4 ... 3-D/Template Challenge

Welcome to the 4th challenge presented by "Just Us Girls"!

All of us here at the Just Us Girls challenge site are very excited & thankful to see so many returning players, as well as new players this week! We would love to keep that creative energy in motion so this week we are presenting you with a 3 Dimensional challenge! We would like to see you add a 3-D flower to your project!


If you would like to learn how to make a Tissue Paper flower, we've provided a how to / video tutorial right here:

So make your 3-D flower using ANY technique of your choice, attach it to your project. Let the fun begin!

How to play: You need to upload your project using this week's challenge to your online blog or public photo gallery. Leave a link that goes directly to your project in the Mr. Linky form at the end of this post. If you upload to online galleries, please also use the keyword or tag, JUGS4. After you post to Mr. Linky please leave a comment on this post.

Deadline to be considered for our weekly top pick called "Chic of the Week" is 9:00 PM EST on Thursday, October 29. All entries need to be posted to Mr. Linky by that time. "Chic of the Week" will be announced on the Just Us Girls blog post on Friday morning following the deadline. (You may still post to Mr. Linky after the deadline, your project just won't be considered for our "Chic of the Week" top pick.)

And now, "Just Us Girls" presents a little inspiration to get you started!

Kristin

Pam



Dana

Lisa

Mona

Maria


Tracey

Blog Candy: Alrighty then, here is a little homespun offering from me! I love to make flowers using various techniques for my creations & I would love to share a little tin of these with a randomly chosen winner. Would you like to add some of my flowers to your stash? Join in on the 3-D/Template challenge for a chance at some Cupcake's Creations fleurettes :) Make whatever you like showing us your 3-D flower and don't forget to provide us with a DIRECT link on your blog or gallery to our Mr. Linky.

Easy Right? We can't wait to see what you create. Thanks for playing along with Just Us Girls!

Chic of the Week #3 and blog candy winner!

Ladies, ladies, ladies!  You are all so amazing!  I skipped from blog to blog checking out color challenge entries and let me just say, I had no less than FIFTEEN projects that were my personal favorites this week.  That is FABULOUS...unless you have to pick just one to highlight here on the blog as Chic of the Week.  LOL!  I just want you to know, having never done this before, I have new respect for the folks who pick projects to highlight in magazines and on blog sites.  It is way hard...there is just too much talent out there!  I am humbled ladies, just humbled!

But before the Chic of the Week, let me announce the randomly selected winner of the blog candy seen below.

The winner of the handmade posies is participant number................

Congratulations Silke! I'll be contacting you soon to get your mailing address so I can deliver your prize!  Thanks so much for playing along with Just Us Girls!

OK, now on to the Chic of the Week ....DRUMROLL please......after much deliberation, the highlighted project this week is this card from:  GWEN SNATER!!

Gwen's card caught my eye for it's perfect simplicity without looking simple! :)  The luscious red satin bow is wonderfully accented with the bright snowflake and the embossing with red gems looks like fine upholstery  matched up with the elegant scroll work of the die cut label.  Great job Gwen!  Congratulations!  I will be contacting you soon with your winner's badge.  We hope you'll wear it proudly :)

I hope everyone takes some time to click through all of the entries.  There are so many truly inspiring projects, pure eye candy I tell you!

I can't wait to see what you all come up with for JUGs challenge #4!  Get all the details here on saturday when our own Mona Pendleton demonstrates a fabulous technique by VIDEO!  You won't want to miss it! 

It's been a blast hostessing this round of creativity with Just Us Girls!  You all make me glad to be a GIRL!  :) Thanks so much for the great reception.  See you saturday!

Just Us Girls Week 3 - Color Challenge

Welcome to the 3rd challenge presented by "Just Us Girls"!

First of all, WOW!  We are so excited that so many of you are playing along with Just Us Girls!  Thank you so much for giving our challenge site such a sweet welcome!  Are you ready for a color challenge??  Keep your creative mojo going with these three colors this week: aqua, red, and cream.   

As you can see in the graphic above, we've used color names from Papertrey Ink for reference. You do not, of course, need Papertrey Ink products to participate, these are just for reference.  The "Hey There Cookie" DP is from the Cosmo Cricket Early Bird collection...I love this line!  So what will you make?  These colors can play happily with vintage themes, winter themes, etc.  From graphic to shabby chic, the field is wide open.  Let's play!

How to play: You need to upload your project using this week's challenge to your online blog or public photo gallery. Leave a link that goes directly to your project in the Mr. Linky form at the end of this post. If you upload to online galleries, please also use the keyword or tag, JUGS3. After you post to Mr. Linky please leave a comment on this post.

Deadline to be considered for our weekly top pick called "Chic of the Week" is 9:00 PM EST on Thursday, October 22. All entries need to be posted to Mr. Linky by that time. "Chic of the Week" will be announced on the Just Us Girls blog post on Friday morning following the deadline. (You may still post to Mr. Linky after the deadline, your project just won't be considered for our "Chic of the Week" top pick.)

And now, "Just Us Girls" presents a little inspiration to get you started!

Kristin

Pam

Maria

Tracey

Lisa

Mona

Dana

Blog Candy:  OK, so it's no $25 gift certificate BUT, I thought it would be fun to offer some blog candy this week that will be handmade just for YOU!  The fabric flower on the card above was made by little 'ol me!  I am loving this handmade flower technique and thought it would be fun to randomly chose a winner to receive an envelope full of these made out of various vintage fabrics.  What do you think?  Want some?  Join in on the color challenge for a chance at some Paper Daydream Posies :)  Make something, anything, with the colors aqua, red and cream and link us in the Mr Linky below. 

Have fun and good luck! Thanks for playing along with Just Us Girls!

Chic of the Week #2 & Blog Candy Winner

Well girls - ALL you girls - who played along with the first BIG Just Us Girls challenge, I am blown away by the number of participants we had this week, AND 96 followers, too! You girls totally rocked our little blog!!!

Ok - It's time to announce this week's blog candy winner - (this is the easy part) - drumroll...... our lucky winner - according to Random.org is #38 .  That number (on Mr. Linky) belongs to Rosemary D!! Congratulations, Rosemary. You have won a $25 gift certificate to EITHER Gina K Designs or PaperTrey Ink. Please email your choice along with your name, real address and email to justusgirlschallenge AT gmail.com (A clickable JUGS email address is not posted here to prevent web bots from getting it then spamming our account but just use @ where it says at and use NO spaces.)

NOW for the really hard part - Chic of the Week - last week we had about ten entries to choose from and that was really hard - well, this week we had 78 entries (by the posted deadline) so the job is ALMOST impossible. You are ALL winners in my book and I wish I could recognize each and every one of you who played along. The cards that were made to support breast cancer were amazing (I hope they will get sent to someone who needs them). Many of you took up the option to add pink so I've been tickled pink all week *grin*. After a couple of sleepless nights and countless trips through the gallery over and over, I finally selected this creation by Broni. Her sassy AddyTude just totally captured my attention - she reminds me of me *grin* and I couldn't pick a better sentiment - I wish more of our young girls felt this way today. Broni's coloring is divine and the paper she picked for piecing is just crazy, fresh and fun! Congratulations, Broni. I will send you your Chic of the Week badge right away. We hope you will "Wear it Proudly."

Meanwhile I want to recognize these entries as a few additional eye catchers this week... Way to rock the challenge!

• Jennie - The trees look fabulous with this fun paper and using the white Flower Soft for the snow was just a wonderful idea. (It's ironic that this is one of the few without pink! LOL!)

• Wendy The sleeve on this dress just looks SO life like I have to keep looking to see if it's fabric or paper.  Add to it an adorable layout and paper pieced coffee cup and background and it's a real LOOKER!

• Lee  I love the way Lee was able to combine two totally different designer papers on the jacket AND the background and pull it off for a totally FUN look. The bling for buttons on this letter jacket made me smile.

• Julie-Ann I love these non-traditional colored stockings and the simple yet striking layout.

• Theresa  I liked the non-traditional approach to paper piecing in this one - with the piecing being behind the focal image but with Theresa's amazing coloring what's NOT to like?!? The whole scene just glows and I think I can smell the smoke from that wood fire.

Remember, Saturday morning Just Us Girls will bring you a whole new Color Challenge. Hope to see you all back on the blog! Thank you for all the support this week.

JUGS Support!!

JUGS needs your support! LOL Our dear friend and team member, Tracey Cuccia has been selected as a top 10 finalist in the Splitcoast Stampers giveaway! She has BIG, selfless plans for the Scrapbox that any of you would be proud to say you contributed to her winning, but she needs our votes!!! She is in third place right now by a small margin, only 62 votes behind first place! I think our JUGS supporters can put her in the lead if we all place a vote!!!


You can vote HERE
Tracey is known as cuccicoo1002 on SCS
Deadline to vote is 16 Oct 09 at noon CST!!


We would really appreciate your vote if you haven’t already placed it!!! Let’s bump her back up to the top! We’ll announce her big plans for the Scrapbox here if she wins ;]


Thank you so much! See you back here on Saturday for a fun color challenge hosted by our own, Dana Gustafson!!

Just Us Girls Week 2 - Technique Challenge & BLOG CANDY!

Welcome to the 2nd challenge 
presented by "Just Us Girls".

Does anyone want to win some BLOG CANDY?? Please keep on reading...

This week we want to spark your creative juices with a technique challenge. We are focusing on Paper Piecing as a way to add color and pattern to your stamped images. Optional: use pink somewhere on your card in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

If you are not sure how to do Paper Piecing, we've linked a few tutorials here:

Gina K has a fabulous video tutorial on StampTV
Joanne B posted this terrific tutorial My Cuppa Joe - Paper Piecing Tutorial
Beate Johns has a wonderfully detailed step by step over at SCS

So, stamp your images, snip up your papers then show us what you came up with! Blog Candy? Keep reading....

How to play: You need to upload your project using this week's challenge to your online blog or public photo gallery. Leave a link that goes directly to your project in the Mr. Linky form at the end of this post. If you upload to online galleries, please also use the keyword or tag, JUGS2. After you post to Mr. Linky please leave a comment on this post.

Deadline to be considered for our weekly top pick called "Chic of the Week" is 9:00 PM EST on Thursday, October 15. All entries need to be posted to Mr. Linky by that time. "Chic of the Week" will be announced on the Just Us Girls blog post on Friday morning following the deadline. (You may still post to Mr. Linky after the deadline, your project just won't be considered for our "Chic of the Week" top pick.)

And now "Just Us Girls" presents a little inspiration to get you started.
(Blog candy deets follow the pics)

Kristin

Pam

Dana

Lisa

Mona

Maria

Alicia

Tracey

NOW for our Blog Candy!! This week, in order to KICK OFF the brand new JUST US GIRLS challenge blog, we are giving away a $25.00 gift certificate to either Gina K Designs or PaperTrey Ink (winner's choice) to one lucky winner! To enter you need to do the following:

1. Participate in our Week 2 challenge by creating a new card with the Paper Piecing technique.

2. Post it to your blog or public online gallery with keyword JUGS2

3. Provide a DIRECT link to the project on your blog or gallery to our Mr. Linky on this post (below)

4. Deadline to post to Mr. Linky is Thursday, October 15, 9:00 PM EST.

We will select a winner using random.org and then post the winner on the Just Us Girls blog on Friday along with our special "top pick" stamper called our "Chic of the Week".

That's it girls - can't wait to see what you come up with. Thanks for joining us in this new stamping challenge. :-)

Chic of the Week #1

Today marks the end of the first week for the brand new, Just Us Girls challenge!  Unbeknownest to the sweet group of participants we had last week for our sketch challenge, Just Us Girls will feature a favorite "Chic of the Week"!!  While we didn't have a huge group playing along last week, it was still super difficult to select just one favorite!  I went back and forth repeatedly until I decided on Tammy's awesome card that she made for her pastor.

I love the subtle, stamped leaves behind the sentiment that overlap the masked sponged area and the crisp white border!  I also adore that patterned paper, the embossed panel, and the ribbon is a perfect finishing touch!!  Tammy, keep an eye out...I'll be emailing your "Chic of the Week" badge shortly!

The other two I would put in my top 3 are LeAnne and Broni!  Just gorgeous creations and I'm so happy everyone could play along!

Don't forget tomorrow marks our second week where we will host a technique challenge!  Swing by at midnight or later to see the deets and our awesome design team's projects!!

Thanks for stopping by!

Just Us Girls Week 1- Sketch Challenge

Thanks for stopping by to see the brand new Just Us Girls Challenge. Your first challenge from the Just Us Girls Challenge Team is a sketch challenge. Remember you can rotate the sketch if it better suits you. It's supposed to be an inspiration. (We are actually posting this after the fact since we didn't have the blog site ready on the day of the first challenge but we wanted it all in one place.)

How to play: You need to upload your project using this week's challenge to your online blog or public photo gallery. Leave a link that goes directly to your project in the Mr. Linky form (this one is on Kristin's blog since we didn't have the site live yet.) If you upload to online galleries, please also use the keyword or tag, JUGS1. After you post to Mr. Linky you can also leave a comment here.

Deadline to be considered for the weekly "Chic of the Week" will be 9:00 PM EST on Thursday, October 8 so all entries need to be posted to Mr. Linky before then. "Chic of the Week" will be announced on Friday, October 9. (You may still post to Mr. Linky after the deadline, your project just won't be considered for the "Top Pick" spot.)

And now Just Us Girls present a little inspiration to get you started.

Kristin

Pam

Dana

Lisa

**UPDATE 10.10.09**

I added the links from the first challenge (JUGS1) that were posted on my blog, below.  There is a new Mr. Linky for JUGS1 below these links...just in case you didn't play along last week but would like to.  You never know what we have up our sleeves **wink, wink**  ~Kristin




Just Us Girls Challenge #1 Participants

1. Dana Gustafson (Paper Daydream) 2. Stampin Pam 3. Joyce 4. Elise 5. Lisa Kind

6. Tammy Hershberger 7. Mona L. Pendleton 8. Linda L 9. Rosemary D. 10. Tammy Hershberger (2 more cards!)

11. Broni 12. LeAnne 13. Silke Ledlow 14. Melissa Ladd

Learn more about Just Us Girls Challenge #1 here.
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