Dear Santa Final Week for 12 Weeks of Christmas Funkie Junkie Style

 Dear friends! I want to thank each one of you who sent me such lovely Christmas greetings! I will be e-mailing you personally, but for now I just want to say how deeply touched I am by your thoughtfulness and generosity.

 I am crossing the finish line at Linda's 12 week challenge 12 Tags of Christmas Funkie Junkie Style with my week 12 offering. Linda has done an amazing job of inspiring so many with her tag challenge for years, and each year her shop The Funkie Junkie Boutique generously sponsors the challenge with three random prizes: generous vouchers to the shop. But that's not all! EVERYONE who participates, completes all 12 weeks, and follows the simple guidelines receives a 10% coupon good on their entire order from The Funkie Junkie Boutique placed in the month of January.

You can see Linda's festive tag HERE. At first glance, what first inspired me about Linda's tag was the textural combination of the rustic burlap with the whimsical tissue fringe. When I read her post about finding elements in her craft room left from previous projects to add to her tag, I was so impressed with how perfectly all those bits worked together. Inspired by that idea, and tried to pattern my card along those lines.

The Kraft Stock scrap, the Santa image, snowflake, and berry sprig were all leftovers from previous projects. The red panel in the back right is a side panel from one of the Vignette Box covers from my Vignette boxes HERE. (I cut off the bottom panels of each cover so the boxes would sit flat and so I could easily access the lights. I did not glue my covers to the boxes in case the lights ever needed to be replaced.  I guess I'm pretty optimistic to think my daughter will treasure these little vignettes for years to come!)

If you look closely, you can see that scrap of Kraft Stock tucked under Santa. It was my first try at embossing and sanding the Kraft Stock for this project. I didn't like how it turned out, and I ended up using it as my experimental piece for different mediums and techniques, so it really should have gone in the trash. Just a little more sanding made it usable for this project, but if you were to peek under the Santa panel, you would not be pleasantly surprised.

This was a stamped Santa image left from the first time I pulled out my new Christmas Classic stamps so long ago. (I wish I had taken some in process photos, as this went through a LOT of changes.) The colors were too pink for the project I was working on at the time, but I thought it had potential, so into the scrap bin it went. I know I used Distress Oxides to color it at first, and gave it a coat of Collage Medium (I think) in random thicknesses at one point, but still didn't use it in that second project, so again, back in the bin. I guess I must have tried drying it with a heat gun, because it has crazing in some areas. (I know I didn't use Crazing, because that's mostly all dried up in the jar.)

For this card, I was trying to color match the reds (which were quite pink) to the reds of the Vignette cover panel and fringe. I added Fired Brick Distress ink with a water pen, and as you can see it didn't stay where I put it, because of the sealed surface. I was OK with the "paint outside the lines" look, but the color still wasn't right. Next I used a brush to add some Watermelon alcohol ink, let that dry and dry brushed with chalk paint to add back some white and soften the lines. Finally I splattered with watered down chalk paint which absorbed some of the color beneath. Oh, well.

I had to include this blurry shot to show you the gorgeous shimmer on my snowflake die cut; wish I could remember what I used on it. I think I may have sprayed Perfect Pearls into my Distress Oxides on my craft mat to make a puddle and then dipped my die cut into that.

Well, that's a wrap for this year's 12 Tags of Christmas entries. I had a blast taking inspiration from Linda, and I cannot thank her enough for her hard work and dedication to making this challenge such a success year after year, even when she is at her busiest! Thank you so much, Linda!

I would like to share in these challenges:

The Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas Funkie Junkie Style Week 12

Scrapy Land Challenge #80 Anything Goes I used two Sizzix dies and a 

We Love 2 Create Challenge 3 - Anything Creative/Mixed Media Goes

Crop Stop December Challenge – Link Party #35

Country View Challenges December 2017 - Christmas

The Artistic Stamper December's Creative Challenge - Christmas

Word Art Wednesday Anything Goes - Challenge Weeks #314-#315

Noor Design December Challenge.... Anything Goes

HeARTful Stamping Challenge Anything Goes + a stamp Dec 17 – Dec 31

Wishing you all a safe and Happy New Year! I will leave you with this quote...

“Let our New Year’s resolution be this: we will be there for one another as fellow members of humanity, in the finest sense of the word.” -Goran Persson

Hugs and Blessings!

Sara Emily

I used the following products which can be purchased at The Funkie Junkie Boutique:

(LATE SEPTEMBER PRE-ORDER) Tim Holtz Idea-ology Kraft Stock - Christmas	(LATE SEPTEMBER PRE - ORDER) Tim Holtz Idea-ology Vignette Box Tops	Tim Holtz Rubber Stamps - Christmas Classic	Tim Holtz Idea-ology Ephemera Pack - Christmas	( LATE SEPTMEBER PRE - ORDER) Tim Holtz Idea-ology Fringe Christmas
(SEPTEMBER PRE-ORDER) Sizzix Texture Fades Embossing Folder - Poinsettias by Tim Holtz 662433	Sizzix Holiday Greens Die Leaves	(LATE SEPTEMBER PRE - ORDER) Tim Holtz Idea-ology Quote Chips	Sizzix Thinlits Die Set - Stitched Rectangles by Tim Holtz 661189 (April Pre-Order)	(JULY PRE-ORDER) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Pad - Frayed Burlap
(JULY PRE-ORDER) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Pad - Candied Apple	(JULY PRE-ORDER) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Pad - Antique Linen	(February Pre-order) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Pad - Walnut Stain	(February Pre-order) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Oxide Pad - Fired Brick	Ranger Tim Holtz Ground Espresso Distress Ink Pad
Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Ink Pad - Frayed Burlap	Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Collage Medium Vintage TDAK47940 (February Pre-Order)	Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Collage Medium Matte TDAK47933 (February Pre-Order)	(February Pre-order) Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Collage Medium Matte 1 oz Bottle	Ranger Adirondack Alcohol Ink - Watermelon