Some Masculine Cards

      Masculine cards always seem more difficult for me to design than feminine ones.   It also seems that stamps and embellishments are more plentiful for designing 'girly cards',  making it even a bit more challenging.  But I need to make a lot of male cards for family and relatives, so I did a lot of searching for inspiration and combined lots of ideas to come up with a few cards.   So here are some of them that I've made this year....................

This card uses a computer laptop stamp from Too Much Fun, stamped in black on gray cardstock.  I then added some white cardstock stamped with the sentiment to the 'screen' of the laptop.  It's difficult to see but the silver background has a silvery sheen and very pretty.  The camera just doesn't pick it up.  I used a striped black and gray ribbon.  I glued a metal decorative disc to the top of a plain paper clip for interest.  The three dots to the left are actually more metal decorative discs that coordinate with the larger one.  

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This card was made for a mechanically inclined relative who really liked this card.  The gears are from Spellbinders.  Not positive on the metal rivet (large background) and diamond plate (gray triangle piece) emboss folders, but I think they are from Sizzix.  I used brads that look like phillips head screws and there are also some mini square brads on the card too.  Sentiment stamped onto some SU punches. Sorry for the lousy pictures.  The camera just isn't picking up the richness of this card at all.  It looks better in real life.

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This card uses a Stampin Up vintage bicycle stamp with copper brads added to the center of each wheel.  The background is embossed and then had distress ink rubbed over the raised areas.  I frayed a piece of burlap and added it.  The edges of both the brown and ivory squares were roughly distressed/sanded for a more vintage look.  A linen ribbon was stamped with the happy birthday sentiment.  The copper button has a linen thread bow added.

Thanks for looking.
~~~ Kathi