Holiday Tutorial – Card Making with Kids

There once was a little girl who so wanted to make her own holiday cards. Her mom, relatively junior in the crafty universe, yet fussy nonetheless, had personal issues about it all.

Preschool cards are messy and generally not so pretty in a traditional, big person sort of designer style way. They require a fair bit of patience to finish one, much less the 100 we (oops, I mean the mom) have on the holiday list each year.

Mom wanted Martha. The little girl, glitter and glue. It was a no-win deal for one of them, and that one was definitely going to be me (the mom).

So, the tiny person sat me down and hammered out a deal.

We’re thinking green this year. So, what better way to make sure a card gets preserved rather than ditched in the trash bin than turning the traditional greeting into a work of art?

That’s not exactly how she put it. More like “I want to make pretty glitter stars that popop and gramma Sharon can hang on the tree.”

OK. I’m easily convinced of the merit of granddaughter-made tree ornaments for the grandpeeps.

There are literally about a million ways to get your tiny people into the card making process this year. I must have pounded through a day’s worth of websites including some faves such as Kids Craft Weekly, Kaboose.com and Flickr groups for holiday projects.

What ended up winning in our house, though, was the glitter stars – with the help of some cookie cutters – to make a totally fun holiday art card that the tiny person literally decorated all by herself. She made 30. Oh how I love the glitter for its obsessive crafting factor:)

Here’s what you need:

- Craft paper
- Glitter
- White glue
- A bowl and paint brush
- A plate or pie tin
- Other adornments like stamps
- Scissors
- A pencil
- A ruler

Directions:

1. Take your first 12X12 piece of craft paper and measure it into the size card you want. We made 6X4 & X6 cards, which turned out three cards a sheet. Depending on your list of card recipients, that will tell you how much paper you need. Cut your cards out.

2. Grab the bowl, glue and paintbrush. Put a loonie-sized blob of glue in the bowl and add just a touch (literally, not much) of water to thin out the glue. Stir it around with the paintbrush. It should resemble a medium to thin paste and be easily spread with a paint brush.

3. Take one of your cookie cutters (we used stars and trees), place it on the front of a card. Then, take the glue and paint inside the cookie cutter, making sure to hit all of the edges.

4. Remove the cookie cutter (it should leave a glue shape on the page). Then, sprinkle glitter over the top of it, shake the glitter off onto the plate or pie tin. You have your card design. Add as many of these as you like on the cards.

5. As the mommy touch, we also stamped each card with a lovely stamp (found at Scrapbook Central) and let them dry a bit.

I love the way they turned out – a bit crafty, a bit sparkly, a bit artsy, a bit tiny person.

And, our daughter is totally excited to drop these in the mail, her art on the cover of each card, for all of the folks we love this season.

Tags: card making, cards, children, Christmas, cookie cutters, crafts, family, glitter, holiday, homemade, Kids, paper crafts, tutorial

Category: ARTS & LITERACY, Crafts