More Starving Artistamps Images to Share

Unfortunately, still no phone or internet service today, so I am still on borrowed/stolen wireless signal. Verizon had promised my phone service would be restored by 3:00 pm today, but that time came and went without a dial tone. Basically, I have spent a large portion of the day rehashing my entire saga (basically no phone for the last 10 or so days, no internet for the last 5 days, different departments within Verizon giving me the run-around) to a whole bunch of people who all work for Verizon but who don't appear to be on the same page about anything or understand that I have issues with both my phone line and my internet service. Where it stands now is that a technician is supposed to be here early enough tomorrow morning to finish the job in time for me to get to work on time. I'll believe that when it happens . . .

In the meantime, I'm still enjoying the images I got recently from Starving Artistamps. I made this card earlier this week using a fun heart image. It's an image from a set of three southwestern ornamental pieces (see the whole set here), but the way I used it here doesn't really have a southwestern look or feel to it--or at least I don't think it does.

I used a bonus sketch challenge posted in the SCS sketch challenge forum. The sketch is designed to look similar to a pretty wrapped gift. The background is done with the drunken chalks technique. You can find a tutorial for this technique here. I made the heart medallion with a faux metal technique. It is so shimmery and pretty in real life. It's a great stand-in for a bow on this layout.

This second card features one of the feather images I used in an earlier card. The feathers are part of a sheet of southwestern images (see it here).I kept with neutral tones for this card. The feather is stamped in brown ink on a piece of vanilla cardstock.

I paper pierced around the edge of the panel. Then, I matted the image on a piece of dark brown cardstock with distressed edges. I placed this on the cardfront, then paper pierced around the matted image. The card is finished off with a piece of dark brown satin ribbon along the edge.

Here's a close up photo of the matted image and the piercing.

To soothe my extremely frazzled nerves (boy, was I surprised my blood pressure reading was actually normal at the doctor's office today just 5 minutes after having a heated discussion with yet another "customer service" representative), in addition to stamping, I've done a little shopping for myself. I usually do this every December, calling it "gifts to self." I figure that if there's no one else to buy me fun gifts, I might as well get them for myself. I usually have some regret when the bills arrive in January, but clearly not enough to stop me from doing the same thing this time each year. My goodies should start to arrive by the end of the week, leaving me plenty of time to try them out when I'm home from work next week.

Materials Used (heart card):

heart image (Starving Artistamps); Wisteria, Orchid Pastel, and Warm Violet chalk inks (VersaMagic); silver ink pad (Encore); Basic Black, Orchid Opulence, and Glossy White cardstock, Versamark, silver embossing powder, dimensionals (Stampin' Up!); black dotted organdy ribbon (Michaels); circle punch (Nestabilities); rubbing alcohol; matte acrylic sealer

Materials Used (feather card):

feather image (Starving Artistamps); Sahara Sand, Chocolate Chip and Very Vanilla cardstock, Basic Brown Classic ink, mat pack and paper piercing tool, Chocolate Chip satin ribbon, dimensionals (Stampin' Up!); copper brads (Making Memories)