Happy New Year!

Far sooner than it feels like it should be, 2010 is coming to a close. A lot has happened this year, from moving back to Canada after a short stint in the States, to being unemployed for the first time in my adult life, to planning a wedding, and marrying the man I not only love fully and completely, but respect and admire as well.

It seems fitting, therefore, to give 2010 the sendoff it deserves. My husband and I are hosting a New Year’s party tonight, with good friends, sparkling wine and, of course, a very loud and exuberant countdown to 2011.

When deciding on what to make for today’s post, I started to brainstorm ideas that reminded me of that one moment – the one where the clock has reached midnight, the sparkling wine is uncorked, and people are hugging and kissing while wishing each other the best in the coming year. After rejecting several ideas, I decided to stick with simple and elegant, resulting in the card above.

Materials:

·      Sheet of 8 1/2” x 11” black cardstock

·      Sheet of 8 1/2” x 11” white text paper

·      4” x 4” piece of silver wrapping paper

Supplies:

·      Computer

·      Printer

·      Paper trimmer

·      Bone folder

·      Scissors

·      Glue stick

·      Glue runner

·      Small star punch

Directions:

1.     Using design layout software*, create a letter-sized page with 1/2” margins. Place guidelines at 4” and 4 1/2” on both the x and y axis. Create a 3 1/2” x 3 1/2” text box and place it at the top right-hand corner of the page, at 1/2” on the x axis and 1/2” on the y axis. Write in the text “Happy New Year” in the font of your choice and resize it to fit the space. Centre the text both horizontally and vertically in the text box.

2.     Create a guideline at 5” on the x axis to create a 3 1/2” wide size guide for your champagne flutes. Place your flute images in the space (I used two of the blue glass of this image here – I flipped one of the glasses to create a mirror image).

3.     Print the page. Use the paper trimmer to cut the text side of the paper into a 4” x 4” box. Set aside. Trim the glasses so that they are in a small square.

4.     Trim the black card stock to 10” wide by 5” tall. Keep the 3 1/2” wide scrap. Fold the card stock in half to create a 5” x 5” square card.

5.     Use the glue runner to attach the silver wrapping paper to the front panel of the card and the white paper with the text to the inside right panel.

6.     Lightly glue the glasses image to the scrap of black card stock. Cut out the glasses separately, then carefully peel off the white paper from the cutouts. If the paper won’t peel off completely, try to get enough off so that you can’t see the white paper from the other side of the card stock.

7.     Glue the glasses on to the front of the card, overlapping them as shown.

8.     Punch four stars out of the remaining scrap of black card stock. Glue them to the four corners of white text paper on the inside right panel.

*If you don’t have design layout software, use text and image boxes in Word, making sure that the flute glasses image isn’t bigger than 3 1/2” x 3 1/2” and the text box isn’t bigger than 4” x 4” (including margins).

Card Tricks will be back on Monday with creative and fun ways to ring in 2011.

I hope you all have a wonderful New Year’s Eve! Here’s hoping that 2011 is fantastic for each and every one of you.

Happy New Year, everyone!