Procrastination...a good thing sometimes...

ok, so maybe not.  I'm sitting at my computer with a PILE of work to do to get ready for the start of the school year next week and instead of getting started, I'm typing a blog post instead!  Can you tell I'm really not ready to let go of summer yet?  The good news for you is that I have another birthday card to show you.  Since I've covered the kids pretty well this week, I figure its time for a grown-up card.  This is another one I designed for my workshop tonight.  The hostess requested a masculine birthday card, so, given the season we are about to begin, I designed this with fall in mind...

Masculine birthday card using French Foliage set with sentiment from Bring on the Cake.

Inside of card

Can you tell I am in love with the French Foliage set?  I was SOOOOO thrilled when it came back in the main catty this year!  It is my go-to fall set...love the realistic looking leaves!  Here is how I put this together:
Starting with a 3 1/2" square of very vanilla cardstock, I randomly stamped the leaves in cajun craze, more mustard and early espresso, stamping off at times to give depth.  I then spritzed the whole thing using my spritzer tool and early espresso marker.  I layered the stamped piece on a 3 5/8" square of always artichoke and then adhered it to an early espresso card base.  Setting that aside, I took a 2 1/2" x 4 1/4" piece of more mustard cardstock and ran it through my Big Shot using the houndstooth embossing  folder.  I then tore off about 1/4" of an inch along one of the long sides and added some early espresso distressing with the mahogany ink and solid stamp from the distressing kit.  I wrapped and tied a piece of early espresso 1/8" taffeta ribbon around the left side and tied a knot.  This was then glued on to the bottom of the cardfront.  The sentiment is heat embossed using pewter embossing powder, punched out with the decorative label and then layered on a second decorative label in always artichoke.  I adhered it using dimensionals.
The inside of the card is simply more randomly stamped leaves and the sentiment stamped in early espresso. 
Easy peasy and effective.  Hope my hostess and her guests like it!  Now I guess I'd better get going on my school work!!