Keeping Christmas {Merry Christmas to you}

"I will honor Christmas in my heart...and try to keep it all the year."-Charles Dickens 

I love everything about Christmas! It's such a magical time of year with such a special feeling! I always have such a hard time putting my Christmas crafty things away. There never seems to be enough time to make everything I want to make, to create as much as I want to create! I decided on Christmas day to try and keep Christmas all year long! With that being said, I will be posting a Christmas design every month ALL YEAR LONG on the 25th of the month! If you'd like to join me, I would be thrilled. To play along, just leave a comment with a link to your blog or project in the comments section! If you're on Instagram, use the hashtag #keepingchristmas2017 and I can see them there. I'd love to see what you come up with.

Today's project was created yesterday, on the most delicious, snowy day! The world was a blanket of white...very inspiring and lovely! I was super excited to use "Deck the Halls", a set that I bought this last Christmas, but never actually used because I ran out of time. I was itching to get it inky.

I made 8 tags; 4 with the large spiraling bow and 4 with the cute, short bow. My color choices were directly inspired by the Christmases of my youth. I always had the most magical Christmases and just seeing vintage bags and tags evokes the most nostalgic feelings in me! The wreaths and bows were die cut using the coordinating "Deck the Halls" dies. I stamped the wreath using "Always Artichoke" ink and the berries were stamped using "Melon Mambo". The bows were stamped in "Spring Moss" ink for the perfect retro feel! I love how they turned out. 

The tags were cut from 140 lb watercolor paper using one of the "Tag Sale" tag dies from PTI. Once they were cut, I blended "Melon Mambo" ink onto the edged of each tag. I spritzed some water onto the tags for a fun watercolor effect with minimal effort. I love how it looks. The sentiment was stamped in Palette black ink and I really love how it looks... like it was made to fit the shape of the tag perfectly. I then stamped the "fa la la la la" sentiment into the center of each tag in a random fashion, placing it where it would peek-a-boo through the center of the wreath. 

After the tags were dry, I ran a versamarker along the edges of the tags and heat embossed silver powder along the edges. It gave it the perfect retro feel I was going for. I also added a 1/4 inch jingle bell from my stash to the center of each bow...squeal. I just love how they look. I also added some star dust stickles to the berries and bows. Every tag from my childhood always had a generous amount of sparkle. Each tag was tied with a length of black baker's twine to finish it off! I'm thinking these tags won't be going on gifts but used to fancy up a cellophane bag of treats of something. Thanks for fluttering by! Follow me on Instagram @kellylunceford #keepingchristmas2017