Pine Cones Galore!

Hello all, and happy 3rd Sunday in Advent.  I'm back for Day 5 of my Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas in 12 days... but I've skipped ahead to Tag 9.   Lots of participants have been playing since Linda Coughlin - the Funkie Junkie herself - started offering her weekly inspiration tags in September, but I've left it until the last 12 days before the deadline to get cracking.

I'm hoping going in the wrong order won't confuse me (there was one year when I nearly missed out one whole tag entirely), but I couldn't wait any longer to play with the "odd one out" folded tag design which Linda had created for Tag 9.

There was a folded tag as part of the 2013 12 Tags of Christmas and my version of it remains one of my favourite ever Christmas makes.  If you take a look at that one, you'll see it actually has quite a lot in common with this new one - pine cones galore!







This time, rather than silvery blue we're full-on with silvery evergreen colour tones, and there are even more pine cones - real ones, stamped ones and stamped + painted ones too.

I've stuck pretty closely to Linda's original version on this one, barring the red accents.

I had a lovely time creating this tag, inside and out, plus I've got lots of mop up inky green cardstock, so that will come in handy for cutting future greenery I'm sure.

I love that this one couldn't help but stay within my natural colour palette for these tags... still on course for a nice co-ordinated set by the end of the 12 days, I hope.













For the first time in the challenge, I'm working with a jumbo tag (Linda's favoured size), rather than a regular one, and I started by spritzing Distress Sprays - mine were Evergreen Bough, Bundled Sage and Peeled Paint - and adding Brushed Pewter mica spray just as Linda did.

I had so much ink on my tag I was able to "print" almost a whole extra piece of A4 card with the surplus.  It also softened the look of the greens on my main tag.













Then I stamped two different Tim Holtz pine branch stamps all around - some in Library Green and some in my much-loved Olive Archival.

I just love the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't shimmer of the mica.













Inside the folded card, you find one of my favourite Christmas sentiment stamps stamped on some inked and spritzed kraft card.














I drew around the shape of the stamp to guide me as I was cutting it out.

I added some Vintage Photo inking around the folds - it ties in with the browns of the focal image and text, as well as framing and drawing the eye inward nicely.













And the beautiful pine cone from the Holiday Wishes set takes pride of place on the centre panel inside.  I stamped it twice, semi-masking it to get the second one behind (I couldn't be bothered to cut a detailed mask - time's wingéd chariot is, after all, hurrying near).











I used some DecoArt Media Fluid Acrylics to "colour in" the pine cones.  I think Burnt Sienna, Diarylide Yellow and Raw Umber were in the various washes.  (Don't worry, it's not your eyes going funny... I did some slightly unsuccessful overstamping, but I'm embracing imperfection!)











I kept the outside very simple.  Some more of the rustic twine (on all my 2016 FJ tags so far), and a couple of real pine cones from my hoard.















They're glued on to the top flap, so that you can tie and untie the twine without disturbing them.














And I glued the twine down on the reverse as well so that it doesn't all fall off when you do untie it to open the card.











So there's Tag 9 for you.  Unfortunately for me, it's only the fifth one I've made, so I've still got a way to go before the finishing line on December 19th.  It is my favourite so far, though.

And I'm loving playing along with Linda's wonderful inspiration.  I'm very glad I had the idea that this would get me back in the craft room.

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  If you want to catch Tags 1 - 4, just scroll backwards from this post... you can't miss'em!  Happy crafting all.

The pine stays green in winter... wisdom in hardship.
Norman Douglas

I'd like to enter this as Tag 9 in the Funkie Junkie 12 Tags of Christmas, sponsored by The Funkie Junkie Boutique