Masculine Birthday

I know that I am not alone in having difficulty making masculine cards. One of my current goals is to overcome this. My Father In Laws Birthday was the other day and here is the card I made him.

 Here are the ideas that I kept in mind when making this card.

1.Choose colors that are "masculine" In this case I used the soon to be retired Not Quite Navy, Whisper White and Daffodil Delight Cardstock.

2. My friend and upline Deb does a great job of using pieces of patterned paper on her cards so my second tip is to use a strip of DSP. This is a strip of Parkers Patterns from the Spring Catalog.

3.  Cluster embellishments - I used
       a) argyles of the Beyond Plaid stamp set from the Spring Catalog (I hope this is carried to the new catalog because I LOVE it)
       b) Happy Birthday from Itty Bitty Banners in Cherry Cobbler Ink
       c) The gifts are from a retired SU! set

4.  "White Space"  Lately I've been trying to analyze what I like about a card when I say I like it. Frequently there is a lot of the background of the card that is not covered with designs (paper or stamped images). I call that white space because it is frequently left white when the base of the card is white. I think this lets the eye rest a bit and draws the attention to the focal point of the card.

All in all this card came together relatively easily.

Thanks for stopping by!!
Andrea