How to Turn Christmas Cards into Bookmarks

I don’t know about you, but I really don’t like throwing away cards that people send me.  A few years ago I did a purge of all the cards I had saved over the years and I gave each one a kiss before placing it in the recycling bin.

In some cases, I was able to reuse the card by cutting it up and using pieces for scrapbook embellishments or even to make new cards.  For the cards that I got for the holidays, I decided to create simple bookmarks (or gift tags) to be used in the years to come.  This is an easy way to reuse cards for all occasions and a collection of these cute bookmarks would make a great stocking stuffer come next Christmas.

You could even use up leftover Christmas bows and ribbons to embellish your bookmarks.  Remember that these will be holding a place in a book, so don’t add too many embellishments because it can warp the book pages.  I left my bookmarks as is, but if you’re using an old card as a gift tag, feel free to add stickers, sentiments, ribbons…whatever your little heart desires!

Recycled Christmas Cards Bookmarks and Tags

Materials:

• Cards
• Scissors
• Ruler
• Pencil
• Ribbons
• Embellishments (optional)

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Instructions:

1. Lay your cards out and use a ruler and a pencil to create lines where you want to cut your bookmark out.  Cut along the lines.  If a card is a bit flimsy, you can glue a piece of cardboard to the back or use the backing from the back of the card to thicken your bookmark.
2. Embellish your bookmarks with ribbons, stickers, glitter, etc.  Remember you want your bookmarks to be flat so they don’t warp pages of a book.

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Celebrate creativity every Wednesday with a “Creativi-bee” post, where I share easy craft tutorials, project ideas, and craft collections.