Make Place Mats Out of Old Winter Holiday Cards

Submitted by
Kayla Chong

Greeting or holiday cards piling up? Let your kids sort them out and turn them into colorful place mats.

Holiday cards:
Gather up all the cards you've gotten this year (plus the ones you've saved for the last five years ...).
Large-sized construction paper:
Preferably 11 x 17 size, but you can also tape two smaller pieces together.
Scissors
Rubber cement
Clear contact paper:
For when your kids spill mashed potatoes on their place mats!
Embellishments:
Stickers, glitter, felt shapes, fabric scraps, magazine cut outs, die-cuts, etc.

Give a stack of holiday cards to the kids and have them sort through and find pictures and phrases they want to use for their place mats.
Next, get the kids to trim the pictures from the cards. Have them arrange their pictures on the construction paper. When they're satisfied with the arrangement, they can glue the pictures down with rubber cement. Add some stickers as decoration as well as some glitter for bling.
Carefully cover the place mats on both sides with a piece of contact paper to make them spill proof.
Use the place mats for their holiday breakfast or lunch, or if you're still holding on to cards from ages ago, have them make enough so everyone can have their own for the holiday dinner.