{Guest Post} Quickie Bookmarks by Amanda Lee

Today I'm happy to have a guest post by Gayle Trent/Amanda Lee, author of Wicked Stitch, the latest book in the Embroidery Mystery Series. 
For most small-business owners in Tallulah Falls, the upcoming Renaissance Faire is a wonderful way to promote their specialty shops. For Marcy’s nemesis, Nellie, and her sister, Clara, it’s an opportunity to finally put Marcy and her shop, the Seven-Year Stitch, out of business. Apparently the sisters like to make grudges a family affair and have set up competing booths right next to Marcy’s at the Ren Faire.
When Clara is discovered dead in her own booth—strangled by the scarf she had almost finished knitting—Marcy becomes the prime suspect. Now she has to do whatever it takes to keep her reputation from unraveling—and get to the bottom of a most deadly yarn....
This is the second book I've read in the series and I was intrigued to see more of the conflict between Marcy and Nellie. (I'm going to have to go get the first book to  find out how it all started!) The Renaissance Faire provides an interesting backdrop to the murder and investigation, with lots of interest potential suspects wandering around. I'll definitely be reading more of the Embroidery Mysteries. 

Quickie Bookmarks

by Amanda Lee

Ooops! Your event (book signing, birthday party, school event) is tomorrow, and you haven’t got any takeaways. Run by your local craft store and get some bookmarks with a clear window at the top. The bookmarks I used open, so you can put your sticker or photograph between the two sides of the bookmark. 

Since I write the embroidery mystery series, I could have theoretically made some small cross-stitch or blackwork project (in keeping with the Renaissance Faire theme of Wicked Stitch) and secured that in place and made some really snazzy bookmarks. But, alas, we don’t have time. Stitching—even small projects—generally takes a bit more planning and time, and this post is for those times when you’ve forgotten something at the last minute. Not that I’ve ever done that, mind you. Not that I’ve ever gone by the grocery store on the way to drop the kiddies off at school because I forgot that the school bake sale or the party or the “snack” (since they’re only allowed so many “parties” per year) was that day! 

But, just in case something like that does ever happen to one of us, here is a quick and easy craft to help save the day.

So you have your bookmarks—check. Now we need full-sized (8 ½ x 11) white sticker pages. You can get these at the grocery store or at an office supply store. Then insert the photo you’d like to use on your bookmark. This can be a little tricky. The bookmark packaging will tell you the size of the opening, but then you have to make sure your photo is neither too big nor too small. I wound up making mine a bit larger than I should have, but I decided I’d rather sacrifice the author name and have the title and the rest of the book cover big enough for people to see it clearly. Besides, if I’m an author and am giving you a bookmark featuring a book, it’s a safe bet that I wrote the book.

Finally, use another sheet of the full-size sticker paper to make a tag line for the bookmark. Look at all that prime real estate in the almost-finished photo above just going to waste! I added the tag line: Murderers can be crafty! And I finished up with my website address. Now anyone with one of these bookmarks can get a general idea what the book is about and where to find more information about it online.

If the event for which you need a bookmark is a school book fair or a child’s birthday party, simply tailor your design to suit the occasion. 

Happy crafting!

Gayle Trent (writing as Amanda Lee) writes the embroidery mystery series. Gayle/Amanda lives in Virginia when she’s not inhabiting the fictional world of Tallulah Falls. You can  find her online at 

http://www.gayletrent.com, https://www.facebook.com/GayleTrentandAmandaLee, https://twitter.com/GayleTrent, https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/426208.Gayle_Trent.

This post is part of the author's blog tour with Great Escapes Book Tours and there's a giveaway for copies of Wicked Stitch that you can enter by heading over to the Rafflecopter Giveaway.