Hubby's Valentine

Here is the card that I made for my husband for
Valentine's Day.
While this is a Valentine the basic idea
would work for any "man card".

The textured layer, which is dark brown, was
done with a Cuttlebug folder. It looks like the decking
from a cattle pot. OK, let me explain, my husband
trucked cattle all over the western United
States for about 10 years. This looks
like the texture of the aluminum on the
floors of the cattle hauling trailers. It
was to help keep the cattle from slipping.
This type of texture is also used on some
of the aluminum steps put on pickups
and ramps for loading things
in the back of pickups.
Why am I blathering on about this?
Because this texture is a very manly
guy type look.

The ric rac is a Sizzix extended cut die.
The hearts are a McGill punch.
The stamp is an unknown from when
I first stamping 19 years ago.

Definitely a Man's Card

This is a card for a man. My husband even liked it!

The train image is by Uptown Rubber Stamps, which no longer exists as a stand alone company. It has been stamped with black pigment ink and the embossing powder is black fineline.

The phrase is printed on inkjet transparency.
It is: "When a train goes through a tunnel and it gets dark, you don't throw away the ticket and jump off. You sit still and trust the engineer. ~Corrie Ten Boom"

The card base is plain white cardstock. I seldom work directly on my cardbase. I have seperate pieces of cardstock cut that are the same size as my card base and work on those. Many of the techniques I use will warp the cardstock and I have found that using a seperate piece for the card front and then gluing it to the base allows me to place the finished piece under a heavy book to dry. The finished product is very flat and crisp in appearance. This is one reason I seldom use double-sided tape.

A Spellbinders Rectangle Nestibilites die was used to cut the opening in the card front and the card base at the same time. Open the card up, place the card front over the open cardbase and hold the two firmly together with low tack masking tape. Pick a rectangle that will fit the size of the transparency, position on the two layers, hold in place with low tack masking tape and run it through your die cut machine.

Now use the same Spellbinders Classic Rectangle Nestibilities die and one a size larger and cut TWO frames of plain brown card stock. These can be held in place on your paper with that lovely low tack masking tape too.

I glued the transparencty in place on the card base. Then glues the base and the front together, matching up the rectangular openings. Now make that transparency stand out a little by attaching one of the brown frames.

You will have an inked piece that has been cut out from the card front. Carefully position in inside the card base so that is shows through the transparency and glue in place. The second frame can be glued around the inked cutout.

The finishing touch was a sponging of brown inks around the outer edge of the card.

The vintage flourish card front was created using Distressed Inks by Ranger. I used the ink pad to pull ink across the entire card and create a scratched wood look, then stamped flourishes with various shades of brown. The final step was to heavily mist the entire piece to cause the inks to "fade" and spread out. Giving a worn faded vintage look.

I think I like these inkjet transparencies!!!! Wild Women of the West Stampers - give it a try.

Basic Stamper Tip: Low tack masking tape is a must have for stampers. I use the lavender low tack masking tape from Walmart. Only under the most extreme pressure will it adhere to card stock tightly enough to pull a layer off when removed. The only die cut machine that can apply that much pressure is the Wizard by Spellbinders.

Gift Wrap?????

This card front is made from gift wrap.

While in the local farm and ranch supply store I spotted

this roll of gift wrap. It is Charles Russell sketches and comments.

It is far too lovely to be wrapped around a gift, then

torn and thrown away, so it became a perfect man's card.

The whole front of the card is covered in gift wrap.

The die cut corners are even a leather look gift wrap

that has been carefully postitioned in a Cuttlebug A2

embossing folder for a tooled leather look.

Gift wrap is an inexpensive paper source

for card making. I am always scanning the

gift wrap sections in stores for new colors and designs

to add to my already healthy stash.