Those Dreaded Cards for Men

So I have joined quite a few swap groups via Facebook.  It has been loads of fun trying my hand a new things like pocket letters, flip books, loaded flip bags.  I love getting to know a little bit about my fellow crafters out there.  It also gives me the flexibility of joining as many or as few swaps as I think I can handle each month.  Not to mention the inspiration....there are some amazing talents out there.

I am currently taking a break from all that.  With the Christmas coming, I knew there would be some handmade projects I would want to tackle so I decided to take a break.

That being said, there was one personal swap that kept getting bumped.  Since somethings in my life have been a bit stressful I just kept putting it off.  There was no actual date so it finally worked out where I had a moment to breathe and put something together for this person.

She will be sending me some, I am sure amazing embellishments, while I am sending her 6 cards that would be perfect for men.  

Now, I don't know about you but if you are a papercrafter, this is the area that a lot of us struggle with.  Bring on the flowers and the You go for it girl sentiments...we are in our element.  Trying to come up with something handmade a man would enjoy in a card form though can seem daunting...heck it is daunting.  I struggle each year for Father's day as well as my husband's birthday.  I get it ....cards for men are hard.

But, I was up for the challenge.  I went to my favorite place for inspiration...Pintrest.  How did you guess?

So over the next bit I will be sharing with you these 6 cards I made just for this swap.  It was fun.  I loved how they turned out.  So get out your die cutting machines, paper, stamps, etc.  Dive in, I know you can do it too!

Here is card #1.  I got out my trusty Cricut machine to put this one together.  I started out with a A2 card base in creme.  I then added some super cute patterned paper by Recollections.  This 6 x 6 paper pad I used throughout these cards.  The paper has a travel theme, but are the perfect shades for cards for men.

The vest and tie was from Cricut's design space.  I layered on the tie, buttons, and the pocket.  To make sure I had the correct color scheme I printed this as a print and cut.  The Happy Birthday sentiment was written by my Cricut using the font babycakes.  I then in the lower left just added a enamel dot I made with those perler beads you see everywhere.

Didn't take too long...the biggest obstacle is getting the computer for a few minutes from my 7 year old because he was playing on it.

I am entering this into CAS(E) this Sketch's #201 sketch as it was the inspiration for the sketch.  I love that challenge blog because the sketch's are really my style, simple.  You can see the other entry's for this challenge here.

Here is a copy of the sketch:

Hope you all have a great week!