Lion King

Hello!

Today's card is heavy on the pictures and details, so I'll get right to it.

One of the challenges for which I made this card is the one over at Pile it On, and their challenge is #44 - For the Birthday Boy.  Masculine cards can be a challenge, at least for me, and I don't have a lot of necessity for them; however, I do love a challenge, and my husband's birthday is in December, so I decided to make the masculine card for him.

This is what's known as a "twisted" card, which is a lot of fun to make.  You follow a certain sequence of steps, and you end up with a card with a pocket on the inside as well as the outside.  Kelly Gettelfinger has a fine step-by-step video showing the process here.  

Let me say right now that this can be a super simple kind of card, and in fact I had fully intended for it to be so.  But...something usually happens and I wind up doing minute detail work, and somehow a simple card turns into a labor-intensive card, but that's just me.  You can make it very simply, and the card itself is a snap.  








 
The base CS is SU Early Espresso, and the animal print paper is a double-sided dp from my stash.  I embossed the lion head image from the Big Cats stamp set from Mark's Finest Papers, a Heinrich Co. in gold embossing powder.  I used SU gold because it is more muted than the razzmatazz gold I usually use.  Then I die cut the image using Dienamics Circle Stax 1 and 2.  I also cut a kraft circle one size up but it's covered by the circle frame also cut from kraft and "painted" with copper Perfect Pearls.

I attached four grommets, two on the front piece and two on the back and painted them with Copper Creative Inspirations paints because the gold was too harsh.  I also toned down the gold charm from Mark's Finest Papers with a black Sharpie because it, too, was a little bright.  Hemp cord was used to tie the card closed.

I didn't have a single manly button, so I made my own from Memory Box Scalloped Buttons dies, using wood print paper and covering them in Aleene's Paper Glaze, then layering them onto a small piece of burlap.  Where there's a will, there's a way.

 For the tag inside, I used kraft paper and stamped it with a name-unknown stamp from Michael's, then sponged the sides with TH Distress Ink in Vintage Photo.  I embossed the greeting with the same gold embossing powder as that which I used on the front of the card.  A piece of fringe is the "ribbon," and the "leather" flower is a medallion that I made using a corner punch on a 1 3/4" square piece of kraft, inked and painted with bronze and copper Perfect Pearls, spritzed with water and scrunched up to distress it.  Can you tell which corner punch I used? 
  

Here's a close up.  

Still can't tell?  It's Martha Stewart's spider corner punch.  It IS almost Halloween, after all.  A SU antique brad in the center finishes things off.

Thank you for visiting me and my blog, and here's wishing you a wonderful week.

Happy Crafting!

Challenges entered:

Pile It On #44 - For the Birthday Boy
Alota Rubberstamps Challenge #93 - Birthday celebrations
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday #192 - Birthday
Creative Card Crew Challenge 22 - Fancy Folds
CCEE1243 - Tag on or as card 
Charisma Cardz Challenge #42 - Don't Be Square
Fussy and Fancy Challenge 74 - Anything Goes
Drunken Stampers Challenge #103 - Pretty Little Liars (card with a secret)