Recycling Christmas Cards

I don't have the time to make my own Christmas cards so I purchase them. There's always leftovers because the cards I pick don't come in the amount I want.
That being said, I recycle the rest into Christmas tags for the next year. I use the inside wording for a tag, and I'll also look for possible designs and use craft punches and rubber stamps.

I cut the center of the Christmas card using
Recollections' 2" craft punch to cut the
circle design

I used Stampin' Up "Just for You" stamp on
the back of tag and punch a hole on the top
and secure it to a ribbon

I used an ornate scalloped 2.5" bracket flourish frame craft
punch by The Paper Studio on both sides of the card

.

Make your own Paint Daubers

I spent almost half the day perusing the web for DIY projects. I came across The Frugal Crafter, Lindsay Weirich's DIY paint daubers at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M3Ac3QGUyI.
In the video she shares how to make glimmer spray ink and daubers. Although, I'm not into glimmer spray ink, I think I will venture into to that some time in the future. Very informative presentation.
However, I really liked her diy daubers. Invested in some cosmetic wedges at the Dollar Tree and I have a collection of plastic soda caps from my grandsons. Lindsay reuses the caps from the bottles which is replaced with sprayers for her glimmer spray ink project.
I really like her daubers, the caps are just the right size. I made one dauber using a 1/2" diameter cap that was about 5/8" tall. It was from a Vitamin E oil bottle. I gave it to a friend.

Here's a picture of my daubers using plastic soda caps.

Cosmetic wedges folded in half and glue together with glue gun

Put hot glue at the bottom of cap  and place bent wedges into cap

Recycling shoe boxes

I like to keep the larger shoe boxes to keep on my closet shelf. Since I purchased some gift wrap at Michael's for $1.50/roll. I thought it would be nice to cover my shoe boxes. I found a nice print of black utensils with a cream background.
Of course it's always nice to have a nice big craft table to work on. Since I did not have one, working on my bed was a quick solution
The two boxes I covered were different from each other. One was a Nike box which had a fold over cover and the other box had a separate lift up cover.
I cut out the half circle holes and ran tape across the edges. I snipped the curved edges so the tape would stay put.
The wrapping paper was a little thin, I would prefer a thicker weight of paper, however, for the time being, at least it looks pretty.
Just a note, sometimes when I first start on sometime new, my mind just goes for it and not realizing that the pattern on the paper goes in one direction, thus the top box cover is going in another direction. So, keep in mind the direction of the design pattern.

Original Nike shoe box

Since the wrapping paper was only 20 inches
 wide, I covered the sides of box first

Finished product

Both boxes

Origami Paper Bow

To save money, I like to make an origami paper bow with the matching wrapping paper. I find this paper bow especially handy while mailing gifts to family. The bow is flat so it doesn't get crushed when mailing. Great instructions on You Tube by:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xohqNiYKJs

Paper Bows on gift package, ready to mail out.