Artist Trading Cards....That I Don't Want to Trade!

As my regular readers, friends and family know, I'm kind of addicted to altered art.  I've wanted to make some more Artist Trading Cards, even though that fad kind of faded about 5 years ago, and I don't know anyone with whom to trade.  Still, I'd purchased a bunch of blank card packages back when I still lived in Washington (which was 5 years ago, now).  I was kind of afraid to try them because I didn't want to screw it up.  However, the only criteria is the card size.  What you put on it is pretty much 'anything goes'.  

In my neverending attempt to use up so much of the craft supplies I've been hoarding, I decided I would knock out a few and see how they came out.  These things are like potato chips...you can't make just one.  I did seven in one sitting.  The next day I did 11.  And I like how they came out so much that I don't want to part with them at all.  Not even a little bit.  

Some of the cards I had on hand were already made from coloured chip board or matte-type paper.

And some of the cards were textured white card stock so I painted those with sparkly and regular water colour paints.  

A few years ago I tried that shaving cream and paint marbled paper.  I used my circle punches to save the best parts of the pictures.  They kind of look like planets and moons.

Another painted card.  I need to grab a real rhinestone and cover the one in the pic.  It looks so real but it's not so I will use a real one.

This poor paper redwood tree was getting very destroyed in my paper supplies.  I was hanging onto it for something special.  It was very fragile and I had to glue all the branches back on.  Then I mounted it on a piece of real wood paper.

Using metal flowers on this BINGO card was a no-brainer.

I really love these shiny/sparkly watercolour paints.  I have to use them more often.  I didn't paint the wings; I bought them that way.  This reminded me of the flying keys in 'Sorcerer's Stone'.

Another card painted with the shiny watercolour paint.  I'm just nuts about celestial stuff.

I covered a blank card with that shell paper and added the glitter to the picture.  Hard to tell but the mermaid is mounted with foam tape so it sticks out a bit from the card.  I did that 3D effect on a few of them.

Another no-brainer.  When I saw I had a bronze coloured card in one of the packs I bought, I used the blue shiny stars and a silver eagle to make a Ravenclaw card.  There is no way in hell I'm parting with this one.  I don't care if someone offers me money for it...this is my fave of all of them.

This idea is what kicked off this whole ATC project.  I'd already put the peace sign patch inside a watch face I had that still has it's glass.  'Time for Peace' came to my mind and then I thought how cool it'd be if I painted one of the cards rainbow and added it.  Since I had all the ATC stuff out to make this one card, I decided to do the others.  

Added the bow and the 'Queen for a Day' charm.

This vintage picture just screamed out for a bright flower.  This sticker was perfect.  It looked good on the silver card.  And then added the rhinestone ribbon.

This is actually a transparency that looked really great on top of the tan card.  It made the design really pop.  I used vellum adhesive tape which doesn't show up against transparencies like double stick tape and glue does.  Edged it with the pearls ribbon.

I like these folded cards too, although they don't stay closed very well.  I covered it in light blue paper and then added all the other stuff.  I thought the mermaid pic was perfect for it.  

I have a few playing cards that are backed with these fantastic pictures of tall ships,  It was hard to choose which one to use.  I couldn't get the flash to stop reflecting  no matter what I did, but the card is beautiful.  On either side are Cuban cigar labels.  Since the text on the Mermaid said, 'La Sirena', I thought the Latin labels worked well.  

I'm not sure what I will do with these.  The other 4 I made a few years ago are hanging in my craft room but I don't have any room for 17 more of them.  But I do know one thing, I'm not trading them!

An Award, Gearing up for A-Z, Life and a Giveaway!

An Award

All of my other blog posts were scheduled to publish so I am a few weeks behind in thanking Tina from the Life is Good blog for presenting me and the other Tina's Terrific Team Members with the Very Inspiring Blogger Award.  Please feel free to take it and use it on your own blogs, as I'd just end up nominating all my friends for it anyway.  I'm supposed to list a few things about myself but I have really run out of stuff that I haven't already shared, so sorry if these are repeats.   Let's see...

1.  I'm very non-competitive and I think that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  I am thrilled if my friends decide to try a craft idea because they saw that I tried it first.  We need more crafting and hand made stuff!!!!  I never liked board games, esp. ones like Trouble, that require a certain killer instinct.  Trivial Pursuit is the only game I really like.  I never joined any teams.  I don't compete with anyone with the games I play on Facebook.   I do, however, enter contests but I don't get upset or in a twist if I don't win.  And if I do win, I will back off on entering on the same site so as to give others a chance to win.

2.  I love having my back scratched and drawn on (with fingertips) and my hair played with.  When we were little, Sharon, Diane & I used to sit one in front of the other and draw on each other's backs, taking turns at regular intervals because one of us would be in the front and not have anything to do while one was in the rear not getting their back drawn on.

3.  Jobs I have held:  Chambermaid/hotel laundryroom (Cape Cod), part time/summer relief radio station engineer (Cape Cod), answering WZOU Boston's Hot Hits request line, switchboard operator in Boston (lasted 1 day), McDonalds cashier in Hyannis (lasted 2 weeks during high school), TV production engineer in Hyannis & Boston, secretary to the owner of a construction company (San Francisco), receptionist/office manager (SF), legal assistant/paralegal (California & Washington), fill-in school lunch lady (current).

4.  Major league pet peeve is that very few people ever, ever, EVER pronounce or spell my last name right.   They always leave out the second 'N', even when I have just said and often spelled the name for them.  It pisses me off to no end and was a source of great frustration growing up.  However, it was important to Russell that I take my name back when I divorced Brian, even though my life was so much easier when my last name was Wolf.

5.  I loooooooooove being a stay at home wife.  I love to spoil Russell when he's home, and believe me, he's spoiled rotten, to the point where I'll dish out the food and bring his plate to him so that he can kick back in his recliner.  I love to cook & bake for him & have all his fave foods when he comes home.  I enjoy the domesticity of cleaning & cooking, taking care of the dogs, being flexible enough to do lunch with Marsha on the weekdays and see mom & my cousin.  I love being a stepmother, especially getting to know my stepdaughter, and being there for her if she needs something during the week.

Gearing Up for A-Z

A-Z starts on Monday, April 1.  I'd like to wish all the participants the best of luck and hope that everyone sticks with it to the end.  And please, for the love of all that is holy, TURN OFF THE CAPTCHA!!!!!  I will not be leaving comments on blogs that have this annoying feature.  I have already backed off on commenting regularly on blogs that have CAPTCHA.  Dump it.  It's only pissing people off and will decrease the amount of traffic and comments you receive.  

That said, I had to make one small change in the comments on my blog. It's so minor that no one's probably even noticed, but I disabled the ability to leave anonymous comments.  I went into my blogger spam folder and was surprised to see the hundreds of comments that landed in there.  Just for the heck of it, I also checked all the comments left on my blog since Day 1 in 2006 and was shocked to see how many anonymous spam comments had accumulated, especially since January of this year.  One of my old posts from 2007 had 247 comments on it, 240 of which were links to garbage!!!  It took me hours and hours to delete all that crap.

Where is this increased spam coming from?  There's a work-at-home thing that's apparently making people money; it was written about in a few reputable sources but said sources failed to give the details of what it entailed.  I had started the sign up process several months ago, but I stopped at the part that stated that you had to "share links to products and services with people".  Reading between the lines, I realized that meant spamming blogs and Facebook pages with said links.  I refuse to do that so I never went through with the sign up.  I can only guess that is what has contributed to the increase in anonymous comments.

I left the ability to email me, although I'm not terribly comfortable with it because I'm getting way more spam on my email since I turned on that feature.  I hardly ever got spam before that.  I will leave it on for the time being because some of my bloggy buddies like to respond via email.  I have also had a problem with a former classmate of mine who got in such a twist over my unfriending her on Facebook (then I had to block her), that she's tried stalking me on Pinterest (I had to block here there too), and she made a FB account in her dead mother's name in order to send me a super nasty message.  If she finds this blog, I will have to disable the email and possibly have to take it private for awhile.  So far she hasn't *knocking wood*.

Life

Not much going on, life-wise.  I continue to look for work but there's not much around here.  I'm on the sub list for cafeteria work in the Wareham School District.  But that pays minimum wage and I figured out that at $8.00 per hour, for a 2.5 hour shift, it's a whopping $20.  Deducting the small amount of taxes and social security, I'll come home with like $15.  Hardly worth it.  That, in no way, helps my dire financial situation, especially when you factor in the high cost of gas and wear/tear on my car.  Not that it's a far drive (7 miles one way).  Almost everything I've applied for on Craigs List has been a big fat scam.  One place was based in Wisconsin and the email I got from them mentioned 'multi level marketing' (aka Pyramid Scheme), and said that I'd be acting as a bill collector for their local accounts, deposit the money into my account and transfer it to their account after deducting my fee/cut.  Um, no. I think not.  Another one said there were court jobs in this area and I applied for it and it turned out to be an ad for paralegal school.  WTF?!?!?!?!  All the other jobs are located way too far away; farther than when I commuted from Bonney Lake to Tacoma.  I'm not going through that grind again, esp. with summer coming up.  I'm getting pretty close to 'would you like fries with that?'  If I could score a M-F morning job at a fast food restaurant that'd be fine, but I don't do nights or weekends.  I applied for a part time data entry job and they emailed me to say they were interested in talking to me but wanted to make sure I knew it was part time and $12 an hour, and was I still interested.  I emailed back that yes, I was interested and part time was what I was looking for.  Have I heard back?  Of course not.

Then we woke up to this on Friday, March 22.....I was NOT amused.  Winter's got a stranglehold on us and won't go away.

At least it melted fast.

So I've been spending my time crafting as you know, spring cleaning which with dogs in the house is like brushing your teeth with oreos.  I haven't done much photography since I quit 365.  I need more memory cards and haven't had the cash to purchase them.  My camera's sensor is dirty again and that's a source of great frustration.  I paid $50 to have it professionally cleaned last fall and it was dirty within 2 days.  I continue to try and clean it myself with limited success.  One of my high school friends is a builder and has offered me a paying gig shooting pics of a remodel he's working on so that will be good.

Here are a few more projects I've done over the past week or so:

Glitter magnets

2 Artist Trading Cards...on the back of this one I put sticker letters that say 'Tempest Fugit'.  The ATCs are about 2.5" x 3.5", so pretty small.

And one that's beach-related.  I added the glitter to her bra and scales.

And here are a couple of colour book pages I did recently as well.

A Giveaway

Finally I want to promote a crafty giveaway at Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe.  If you enter, please mention that I sent you there so that I get more entries!  I know I don't have a snowball's chance in hell to win anything because of their huge following, but I keep entering anyway.

I'll see you all Monday, April 1 for the beginning of A to Z!!