It's Christmas! Day 10: Sending Christmas Cards

It’s Christmas! is a 25 day blog and vlog segment that I’ll be doing this December to bring you crafts, reviews, and ideas to make your Christmas season even more fun this year (especially, with this pandemic thing we’re all trying to navigate).

Hopefully, my family can inspire yours to not let this crazy year ruin the holiday season for you.

One thing we really enjoy doing every year is sending (and receiving) Christmas cards.

There are 3 main kinds of cards to send.

The first kind is your traditional card. Some people still send these, but really, the only ones we receive are from older relatives. You know the cards, they have some cute scene on the front and some cheesy saying inside. I can say, half the fun of sending these cards is going to the store and picking out awesome cards. Sometimes people write a personal note inside and sometimes they just sign it. Either way, it’s fun to see the different cards you get.

The second kind of Christmas card is a picture card. These are the ones we usually send every year. You know the ones. I’m sure if you’re like us, you receive tons every year. Honestly, these are my favorite. I absolutely love to see how people have changed and what their families look like nowadays (especially since I haven’t seen most of these people for a while). Sometimes we just do a picture on the front, sometimes we do pictures on the back, and sometimes we write a little note about how our family is doing. Here’s how our card turned out this year.

The third kind of Christmas card is homemade. I think this is the best kind of card for kids to send. Every year, my son makes homemade cards for his grandparents and sends those out himself.

Today, we’re going to learn how to make a pop-up card.

First, let’s get our supplies. You will need cardstock in a variety of colors, scissors, glue, glitter, stickers, tape, and anything else you can think of that will enhance your card.

Now, we’re going to work on the base of our card. I cut a piece of cardstock to 4 inches by 6 inches. This is the inside of our card. We need to fold it in half. Now, we’re going to use a ruler to measure 1.5 inches from each side. Then, we’re going to measure 1 inch up from those lines. Now, using your scissors, we’re going to cut along those lines. Pull that strip up and fold your card again to create a box shape inside.

For the outside of our card, we’re going to cut a piece of cardstock to be 5 inches by 7 inches. Fold this piece in half just like you did with the inside piece. It’s time to attach the 2 pieces of cardstock. Being careful not to glue along the strip that you cut out, glue your inside piece to your outside piece.

This is the base of our card. Decide what you would like to pop up from your card and create that item. Be sure it’s no more than 2 inches tall though, or it will poke out from your card and the effect just won’t be the same. I chose to create a Christmas tree. Before I put my Christmas tree in place, though, I want to decorate the background for my scene inside. I’m going to put my tree in a city. Now that I have my cityscape, I’m going to glue my Christmas tree onto the box to make it stand out.

The last part for the inside of my card is to write a message and sign my name to the bottom.

But that can’t be the end. We need to decorate the front of our card. I’m going to go pretty minimalistic for the front of my card. Now that we’re done, it’s time to put our cards in envelopes, address them, slap a stamp on them, and put them in the mailbox to be taken to their new homes.

I hope you liked our little activity and no matter what kind of Christmas cards you send, no matter how many you send, I hope you will consider sending a couple to the people you love the most. I know I always feel really special when I get cards in the mail.

As always, from my family to yours, Merry Christmas!

Mailbox Makeover

About a month ago, my sister asked me if I could make her a mailbox decal showing her address. She had just gotten a new black mailbox after a snow plow had taken out her old one. She sent me a couple examples of things that she kind of liked off of Etsy. Then, her husband chimed in with "make it have a fox!" He thought this was very clever because they live on Foxford Drive. I wanted to make sure it still looked somewhat classy while incorporating the fun aspect of the foxes. I came up with a couple options and my sister chose her favorite.

This is what we came up with!

Before:

After:

I created this design on Cricut Design Space and then cut it using my Cricut. I made sure to cut two of them so that one could be applied to each side. Then, I weeded them and brought them to my sister's house. I used Duck brand clear contact paper to transfer the design. Here are the steps I followed to apply the design.

1. Clean the mailbox thoroughly with alcohol.
2. Remove the backing and position the design where you would like it. Use the scraper tool to ensure the design is stuck to the mailbox.
3. Carefully and slowly remove the transfer sheet. Make sure to pull at a 180 degree angle. If you pull directly toward yourself, the design is more likely to come off and not stay on the mailbox while you're removing the transfer sheet.
4. At this point, I lightly rub the design again to make sure it is really stuck on there.

Since mailboxes are outside (duh), I like to look at the forecast and make sure there is no rain predicted for the next 48 hours or so. If there is, I'll either wait for a better time or like I did with theirs (since my sister lives 2.5 hours away from me), I applied the decal on Saturday after their mail had already been delivered, put a large trash bag over the top and tied it in place using string. I instructed them to just take the bag off Monday morning before they left for work. The decal is still sticking nicely and they have the best looking mailbox in their neighborhood. This is such a simple way to add a little curb appeal.