Pictured above: A family who is clearly not normal. They are a little too excited about their dollar store purchases. (Photo taken circa 2014.)

Personal Life

Welcome to my website!  My name is Tanner.  At the time of this writing, I’m 35 years old.  I have been married to my trophy wife for about 14 years, who fills her time with random acts of kindness like mowing her in-law’s yard and seeks to help the needy.  Aside from all that, she is a cheap date to go out with, as most waitresses mistake her as someone who should be picking from the kid’s menu!

Together, we have a nearly 13 year old son who is the best thing that has ever happened to us.  He makes us smile and laugh on a daily basis.  With what we save on restaurant bills from my wife’s youthful looks, we spend a whole lot more to satisfy the hunger of our newly emerging teenage boy.  I don’t know where he puts it!

As a family, our belief (individually) is that all who believe in Jesus will be saved, and that salvation is a free gift! (Romans 3:23, Romans 6:23, Romans 5:8, Romans 10:9).  You can read more about that here.

We believe what the Bible has to say is true, and try to live how Jesus would want us to live.  We believe we are put on this earth to glorify God.  This is done in a number of ways.  The Bible talks about a number of things, namely:

• Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.  (Mark 12:30)
• Love your neighbors as yourself (Mark 12:31)
• Make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:19)

Among others – there are many ways we can glorify God, and they are talked about all throughout the Bible.

I’d love to talk to you about this if you have questions.  Feel free to email me at tanmanbaseballfan@gmail.com – whether you do not yet know Jesus, or are already a believer in Him!

Beyond this, the rest of this page … this website is utterly meaningless in comparison to the above.  However, if you do want to indulge me in hearing more about the rest of who I am, feel free to keep reading 🙂

Work Life

In 2000, I started my own website development firm.  Since then, I have been fortunate to have been a part of launching hundreds of websites for oil & gas companies, record labels, churches, television personalities, authors, marketing firms, dealerships, photographers, national chains and more!

When some hear “website development firm”, they may think high rise building, lots of traveling, full time staff and $1,000 suits.

Let me paint a more accurate picture for you.  Think: work from home, no traveling,  t-shirt/shorts attire and utilizing various highly skilled contractors.

In any event, I’ve been known for my creativity and getting the projects done on time.  There is a reason I have been in business for 15+ years!  My original claim to fame was due to my top notch design work through photoshop and flash.  As time went on, I developed the ability to create some pretty incredible database driven websites.  At the time of this writing, we are working on websites for a home builder, choral society and financial advisory firm.  Oh! And … uh, I guess this one, too!

If you are interested in a quote on a website, feel free to contact me at tanmanbaseballfan@gmail.com

Baseball / Hobby Life

Where do I begin?  Ahh yes, let’s start on March 12, 1989.  My dad and I went to a baseball card shop, and I picked up a wax box of 1989 Topps baseball cards & a few packs of “Eight Men Out”.   I vividly remember the box of Topps cards, but I didn’t recall the date until my mom found some of my old journals.  Here is one I wrote in 1990 at the age of 9.

When mom showed me this, I observed two things : 1) My handwriting has probably actually gotten worse, and 2) Some things never change.  I used to write a LOT about baseball cards as a kid, and 25 years or so later, here I am – writing about baseball cards.

I took a hiatus for several years, doing the whole friends/girls/get married/start a career/have a kid thing.  As with so many other guys my age, I came back to what I loved most as a child.  Collecting baseball cards.

Collecting was fantastic, but in such an impersonal world (thanks to the internet) it just seemed … flat.  No card shops were around anymore, and Ebay had taken over.  No one I knew personally liked cards anymore – heck, those that knew I collected cards labeled me as a grown up nerd.

Guilty as charged!

In an effort to give my hobby another dimension that was lost to me, I decided to join online forums having to do with my lost love of collecting.  To me, you became those crazy Giants fans down the street who hoarded Will Clark and Kevin Mitchell cards.  You became the annoying (but loved) frenemy who loved Orel Hershiser and never missed an opportunity to remind me of Kirk Gibson hitting the monster off of Eck in the ’88 World Series.

With my new found community, I grew to love coming online to feel “normal” again.  To know that I wasn’t the only person out there crazy about baseball cards.  Something still felt a bit “flat” about it all, so I began to wonder. 

What if I were to write about collecting again, just like I had done 25 years ago?  Surely, that would be a fun outlet for me!

So, in 2011, I opened up a free blogger account and made my first post.  It was around this time that I had become more than a collector.  I became a reseller.  A reseller who loved documenting his deals just as much as scoring them.

It helped as a way to journal not only the big scores, but also the big whiffs.  If I hit the jackpot, I’d write about it.  If I struck out big time, I’d write about that as well.

Down the road, I started writing spoof “gotcha” stories that received great feedback from the online collecting community.

Later on, I started documenting my “flip quests” – taking one small card, and using it to buy/sell/trade my way to something huge.

Perhaps what I am known best for in the collecting community are the custom baseball cards that I make for my personal collection.  I tell the story of how each piece came to be so you can read about it, and so I can look back on it later.

I have done many crazy things with my custom cards.  Here are a few:

• Cut up a game used bat
• Destroyed REAL 1/1 cards to use the memorabilia / autographs in them
• Created a custom relic lego card
• Invented a booklet card with cut up pieces of real rookie cards
• ….and TONS more!

Writing about all of these experiences and projects has brought collecting to life for me.  It isn’t just about the writing though.  It is about the positive feedback I have received.  Your feedback has truly compelled me to take everything and run further than I had ever imagined.  It is my hope that my stories and creations can in some small part add a new dimension to your hobby as well.

My next big dream and goal is to write a book.  I am in the middle of it right now, and I would be honored if you would pick one up once it is published!

Hope to hear from you soon,

Tanner aka Mouschi