Santa is coming to town

Is it time for Christmas cards yet? I'm sure many of you are hard at work for the festive season and maybe already a little exhausted by the preparations. 
Since I'm a bit our of crafting lately, it was a great feeling to take out my yarns and patterns and create some needlework for the December Fadengrafik Challenge. It's a "Santa Claus" themed one this month and we'd like to see any of your crafting projects as long as you include some paper stitching and the friendly, old present-delivering guy. 
In my inspiration card, I used a picture that is actually cut from a piece of patterned paper with vintage motifs. At first, I thought the round images would do great as baubels on cards if I decorated them with bows, but when I tried to use them this way, it just didn't have the effect I had imagined. 

Instead of throwing the cut-outs away, I was looking for another way to use them. In the end, I decided to try if they match with one of my stitching patterns. Honestly, the reason was a rather practical one: I was due for my inspiational card anyway, and if was about to make a card, why not use something that is already there?

However, I wanted the image of Santa and his helpers to remain the centerpiece of my card, which is why I used one colour of stitching yarn only. As I decorated the vintage print with a golden border sticker already, I picked golden yarn for my stitching, too, and let the gemstones and pearls do the trick in terms of colours. 

For the background, I've chosen a red and white vintage-styled background paper, as well as a layer of dark red cadboard which makes the stitched part pop out from the card itself. 
Before I glued everything together though, I added an extra layer of white cardboard to the back of the image. That way, it stands out a little less than it would with 3D pads, but still a little more than it would if I used no additional help at all. 

A little contribution to the December collection of Create in Austria - artwork created by Austrians and/or in Austria.

challenges: 
- 4 crafty chicks: ATG
- 613 avenue create: ATG
- a bit more time to craft: ATG
- cardmania: Christmas
- cardz4guyz: reindeer
- Christmas cards all year round: ATG
- city crafter: I believe in Santa Claus
- come and get it: animals
- crafty catz: ATG
- crafty sentiments: ATG
- craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge: ATG as long as it's Christmas
- craftyhazelnutschristmaschallenge2: ATG as long as it's Christmas
- craftyhazelnutspatternedpaper
- creative moments: ATG
- deep ocean: Santa is coming to town
- double D challenges: here comes Santa Claus
- everybody art: ATG
- fabnfunky: Christmas
- fairytale challengeblog: Christmastime animals
- inspiration destination: ATG
- love to craft: ATG 
- moving along with the times: Christmas animals
- pennys papertake: ATG
- scrapping4fun: Christmas
- crazy challenge: ATG
- through the craftroom door: ATG
- wortartwednesday: ATG
- worldwide open design team challenge: ATG