I have often debated what to do with all the Christmas cards we get each year after Christmas is over and I'm sad to say my solution has always been to throw them away. Yikes! I know, wrong huh?
So this year I was determined to do something with them. Here was my solution:
I wanted something simple enough that I could repeat it every year. It would have been fun to spend days decorating it and making it fantastic, but that would be a hard act to follow every year, so simplicity was the key here.
This little book is holding all 87 of the cards we received. I didn't include Christmas letters- SORRY if you sent me one, but they just didn't look or fit right. That didn't sound very nice did it? Gulp. Well, next year if you want in the book, stick your letter inside a Christmas card and you're golden! :)
It will be very fun to have a collection of these little books to pull out year after year and see how these families have changed over time. I wish I had all those old cards back! waa :(
So, it's pretty elementary how I did it, but here are the instructions anyway!
1. Gather all your Christmas cards and determine which is the tallest and which is the widest.
2. Scrounge up 2 pieces of cardboard- cereal boxes work well!
3. Place the tallest card down on the cardboard vertically and the widest card horizontally and mark and measure the dimensions of your covers. Don't forget to add about 1/2 an inch to each cut, so the cover extend past the cards slightly. Cut the covers to the correct size.
4. Cut a rectangle out of cardboard. Punch 2 holes in the rectangle about 4-5 inches apart. This will be your guide for punching holes in your covers and cards so all the holes will always line up.
5. Using the guide, punch holes in all the cards.
6. Feed the cards onto 2 metal rings. I put the cards in alphabetical order and with our own Christmas card on top.
7. Now the fun part- decorating! Tape paper onto both sides of the covers and add all the stickers, chipboard details, lettering, etc. that you want. Now using the guide, punch the holes in the covers. On the opposite sides of where you just punched, punch 2 more holes about 2 inches apart for the ribbon.
8. Add the covers to the rings.
9. Feed ribbon through the back cover holes coming out through the top cover and tie in a bow.
Yeah! A solution... and a cute one too!
