All Tied Up

Happy Father's Day!  I remember my dad in his suit and a variety of ties!  I don't see that as often in my every day work life but I have fond memories of my dad dressed up in his suit.  In honor of him and father's day I made a few cards using the tie as my inspiration.  I made three ties using the new DarkRoom Door  Gazette background stamp.  I made this card and shared it previously.

 I cut out three ties using a template I created that looked like this:

I cut little rectangles to fit on the top of the tie to give an extra layer for the knot in the tie. I then cut a background panel from white cardstock.  I stamped all of the pieces using the  Gazette stamp and Black Archival Ink.

I sponged each of the ties using a different color (blue, green, and orange) dye inks.  I distressed the edges with a distressing tool and then sponged the edges with brown dye ink. I attached the knots to my ties.

After that I added a few metal charms with twine to the tie and used the Alpha Strips to create my Happy Fathers Day Sentiment.  I wanted the words to look like tie pins so I mounted them on black to make them pop out.

After I assembled the card I started thinking about how I wanted to try creating a card for each tie to give it more of  a focal point.  I pulled the three ties off the card and made three separate cards.

First I made a small tag card:

I remembered I had several cigar bands in my stash which would make a perfect tie pin.  I pulled them out and found a lovely red and gold band.  I cut it to fit the center of my tie.  I then designed the card around those colors.  I mounted the tie onto a white background distressed with a hint of brown.  I layered that onto a red cardbase.  I added a few strips of red cardstock at the top and bottom.  I added touches of gold all the way around the edges with a gold Krylon pen.  I added a couple of vintage buttons with a gem inserted in the middle.  I finished it off with a Dear Santa - Wordstrips which says celebrate.  I think this looks a little like a champagne bottle.

My next card went with a more CAS design:

Following the idea of a tie I decided to make a background that looked like a white shirt.   I created a white cardbase and scored a few lines on either side of a white mounted background.  I distressed everything with a touch of brown ink.  I cut the corners to follow the lines of the tie. I added a new tie pin from metallic cardstock with the same charm moved up onto the tie pin.

My final card used the most pieces from the original card but changed the cardbase and design.

I hope this gets your ideas flowing for those hard to make masculine cards.  I love the way the gazette background provides wonderful textures and depths to the focal image and the background.

Happy inking!

Suzz