The 2015 Secret Santa Report:
Hope your holidays were jolly and full of small moments to cherish. This was our 4th annual Secret Santa exchange. We are a community, all working in the creative economy and using our gifts and living by the seat of our pants to create a meaningful live for ourselves, so to ask you to send a gift to a "stranger/friend" means stepping out of the working for yourself and sharing the fine gifts we all have as artists. What a great job you did!
This year we had over 50 participants, a record number! The Santas really got in the spirit of things, flinging remarks at one another on the drawnames.com site and doing a great job of getting their gifts out on time.
Some great gifts were exchanged. You could really tell these did not come from China ;), but were lovingly handmade. See many of them displayed here: http://www.artfairinsiders.com/forum/topics/thank-you-to-my-favorite-secret-santa
Everyone who Santa-ed will receive our famous Red Dot bumper sticker in the mail. Please email me your mailing address, plus a special "santa" gift on their page on AFI, reindeer signifier.
Everyone who posted a photo/story of their gift at the above link was eligible to win a prize. This year's prize is a handmade pen made with real bourbon barrel wood as a gift from AFI, made by member Joel Lockridge.
Our esteemed judge was Liz Rundorff Smith from Artisphere in Columbia, SC. Her choice:
my favorite post (photo and story) is the post by Patricia DeMaria who received a glass bowl made by Kristin Collier. I loved the picture Patricia posted of her Hungarian mother-in-law holding the glass bowl. I imagine that she was looking at it and thinking it was really beautiful and so I like that Patricia shared that moment.
Congratulations, Patty. I think you have participated every year.
Thanks to everyone who participated. It was fun for me to organize and I loved seeing the gifts. Hope you'll play with us again next year. It has been suggested that we get started earlier next year so we can have this done earlier. Look for the signup info in your mailbox in November!
P.S. It seems I signed up with two different names and received two gifts. Many thanks to my Santas. I will always treasure these gifts, a warm reminder of the caring that I have received from this community.
Replies
Thanks, Connie...this was my first time participating in the Secret Santa Gift Exchange and I have to say that I felt like a kid again anticipating the arrival of my handmade gift! With 2 new grandchildren, one tends to forget about grown-up gifts, so this was a real treat. I'll definitely be signing up again next year...wishing everyone a happy and prosperous new year!
Congrats to the secret santa winner.. this photo says so much about how important it is to receive a hand made gift.. Hope everyone has a sensational 2016..
Thanks for picking me for the post-Santa prize! I hope she loved it!
Excellent choice on 3 fronts - the item itself, the story, and the photography!
Glad you thought so, Ruth. Liz did a great job. Patty did a good job telling her story too.
I still remember the cute photo of you sleeping on the hand embroidered pillowcases with the chocolate that you posted a few years ago.
A little housekeeping.