A bit of Graffiti x 2

Another not-so-young but not-so-old nephew... graffiti design to the rescue! I fell in love with these series of stamps such a long time ago...it was fun to pull them out once again! My color scheme includes a shade of purple - here seedless preserves - as that is a favorite color of said nephew. Added a blue, a teal and a few pops of black. Made three backgrounds, and I have to say, the hardest part of these kinds of cards is that I fall in love with the backgrounds then hate to cover them up (or horror! cut them up!). I think I may actually add Very Little to the last background....but for now, it will reside in my 'to be finished' stash. Sadly, it will have lots of company there!

Once I had the background done, I created another strip of graffiti elements that I then cut into a fishtail end. After I created the sentiment strip, I added an arrow to help direct your eye to the sentiment. Because I just cannot do two things exactly the same, I used two different arrows on my cards. A very small difference, but that serves as a reminder of how indecisive I can be - a trait that adds unnecessary time to my cardmaking! Thanks for visiting my blog!

Supplies Used:
Stencils: Altenew: Splatter Stencil; Sugar Pea Designs: Concentric Circles  
Stamps: Hero Arts: Brush Strokes; Darkroom Door: Coffee Stain; Sugar Pea Designs: Greatest Hits, Stamps By Judith and Heather: Dots

Ink: Distress: Seedless Preserves, Chipped Sapphire, Evergreen Bough; VersaFine: Onyx Black; VersaMark
Other: White Fine Embossing Powder

 

Red Grand Slam Card

My fourth and final baseball card once again came together quickly thanks to the fun Doodlebug dp. Stamped a sentiment in gray under the square which I matted in red. On a separate piece of cardstock, I stamped three alternating rows of the baseball stitching and another pennant using the Grand Slam sentiment this time. Popped up the pennant and adhered this element to the bottom of the card. Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies Used:

Stamps: Power Poppy: Play Ball!

Ink: Memento: London Fog; SU: Real Red

Paper: Doodlebug Design: Home Run Collection

Baseball Allstar Card

My third baseball card utilized a baseball diamond square cut from the playful Doodlebug dp. I cut a coordinating green strip in two to border either side of the diamond then added strips of green washi tape. Once again, elements were stamped from Power Poppy's Play Ball! Stamp Set. For the bottom element, I carefully cut out just the one bat and mitt from the more complex stamped image and colored them with colored pencils. I also used another image from the set for the top element and sentiment. Finished this card off with two green star brads. Happy Baseball Season! TFL!

Supplies Used:

Stamps: Power Poppy: Play Ball!

Ink: Memento: London Fog; VersaFine: Vintage Sepia

Other: Washi Tape, Brads, Prismacolor: Colored Pencils

Paper: Doodlebug Design: Home Run Collection

Play Ball!

Here's a second Baseball Card in Cubbie Blue. The cards come together so quickly when you have such fun paper to work with! To enhance it just a bit, I stamped the baseball stitching onto strips of white cs, and added some embossed stars. I cut the words out of a strip of dp, then matted them. To finish, I used dimensional squares to pop up the stars and word strips. TFL!  

Supplies Used:

Stamps: Power Poppy: Play Ball!

Ink: SU: Real Red

Dies: Sizzix Originals: Stars#2

Other: Cuttlebug: Swiss Dots ef

Paper: Doodlebug Design: Home Run Collection

Go Cubs Go!

I just bought the super-fun double-cut alphabet dies from Concord & 9th. I've wanted them for so long but every time a sale would come up, they were out of stock. So happy that Hallmark was able to deliver! The CUBS logo was so easy thanks to those dies as well as two nested circles cut into a 'C'. That Doodlebug dp was so fun to use I just HAD to make a few more cards. Go Cubbies!!

Supplies Used:
Dies: Concord & 9th: Double-cut Alphabet, Spellbinders-Nestabilities: Circles 
Paper: Doodlebug Design: Home Run Collection

Billiards Card

Masculine birthday cards are challenging in and of themselves, but as my 'little' nephews grow up (now in their thirties!!) it is getting harder and harder to find just the right design for their cards. One can make only so many guitar or basketball cards! Luckily my soon-to-be-thirty-year-old son came up with a great suggestion: Pool!

Not having any stamps remotely close to the game, I spent some time googling pool tables, billiard balls, cue sticks, etc. Then I spent more time unearthing every circle die/punch I could find in order to find the perfect sizes for those tiny little billiard balls. All the numbered balls represent my nephew's birthdate and age ('32' on 4/5/89). (I did have to point this out to most, but my clever nephew did figure it out with very little coaching.) One of the trickiest tasks was to make the 'stripe' on the No. 9 ball. The table was easy enough and so was the cue stick. A bit of blue ink for chalk, white pencil for the tip and a few strokes of brown copic markers for the bottom made it look rather realistic. 

A fun card to make and I thought of another good idea for these young adult men: Poker! I'm ahead of the game for next year! YAY!

TFL!

Supplies Used: 

Dies:  MFT: Hot Cocoa Cups Die-namics (larger circle die), standard hole punch (circles for numbers); corner rounder punch; Concord & 9th: Double-cut Alphabet;

Stamps: SSS: You Matter

Celebrating 21st Birthday

Created this card for a nephew who is turning 21. Got my inspiration from Sketch #548 at Just Add Ink. Decided to use various distress inks in masculine colors with my stencil. I usually don't ink up the card base itself, so I don't use 'good' card stock for my card bases. This fact made inking not as easy as it could've been had I used the shinier Ranger Speciality Paper which is much kinder to Distress Inks. I think it still came out okay, though filling in all those tiny spaces was a bit tricky. I used lots of tape for masking! I tried hard to go with a CAS design here, and I think I finally succeeded. I stopped myself from adding more embellishments (like sequins) to keep it clean and also to keep it more masculine-looking. 
I'm also adding this to the Challenge #194: Birthday at Addicted to CAS. Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies Used:
Stamps: Riley & Company: Beer Stein; Stampabilities: Everyday Expressions
Ink: Distress: Chipped Sapphire, Fossilized Amber, Walnut Stain and Fired Brick; Memento: Paris Dusk; Copics
Other: Picket Fence Studios: Point of Interest Stencil, Glossy Accents, Marvy: Snow Marker
Dies: MFT: Stitched Circles; Spellbinders-Nestabilities: Labels One