Grandpa's Birthday Card

I find it really tough to find/make male birthday cards. I just find they're always so generic. My dad doesn't like fishing, football or DIY so.. none of the cards in the stores suit him! Also, when making cards, I sometimes find it tough to make a card not look too girlie.

I was appointed to make a birthday card for Charlie's grandpa Bob, and decided to look through my dies to see what I could whip up. I found a shoe die and decided to get creative!

I put the shoe die through my big shot and decided to work my way around it on the card, finding card stock and papers to match. The papers I used was from an A5 paper pack by Papermania called 'Elegance'.

I covered some card with the papers, and wrapped a matching ribbon around the card, placing a sentiment in the middle of the card, which was also from the Papermania Elegance range, so it matched perfectly.

To go with my shoes, I made a bow tie from some ribbon and some tape. I made a knot in the middle of the ribbon and then folded one side in sticking it with double sided tape, did the same to the opposite side. To neaten it up I folded a smaller separate piece of ribbon over the knot, to give it that bow tie effect.

My die cut shoes looked boring on their own so I decided to loop some waxed cord from my macramé bracelet making through the shoe lace holes. Then, to outline the detail I used a brown pro marker to gently outline the embossed detail.

When I stuck it all together on the card it looked great! Elegant and manly.

Do you have any tips to make cards look more manly? Stay tuned as up next on the calendar is Fathers Day!

Happy Crafting!
Mama x