The idea for this post goes back decades ago, when I was a child myself. Although Romania was a communist country back then, people celebrated Christmas nonetheless. There was always a beautiful tree decorated with precious ornaments that had been in the family for generations, there were presents, too. State employees also received gifts for their children, only not from Santa Claus, but from a so-called Father Frost. As Christmas was not officially acknowledged, there were few types of Christmas cards available, so most years we resorted to making our own cards.
A couple of weeks ago I was rummaging through some drawers, looking for old family photos, when I found this old card I made when I was a kid.
Maybe it's not that fancy, after all it's made out of wrapping paper, but it is very precious to me. I remember there was another model, with the picture of a girl in front of a decorated tree, but I no longer have any of those. If you look closely, you'll see it says 'Season's greetings', no mention of Christmas, which is rather modern if you think of it. (No idea why they put English greetings on wrapping paper back then...)
As this year we've already bought an insane amount of wrapping paper, I decided to make some old style cards out of it. After all, I have everything I need around the house:
- Wrapping paper
- Colored cardboard
- Glue stick
- Colored glitter
- Christmas-themed stickers (leftovers from previous years)
What you need to do is cut out the images you like and stick them on folded pieces of cardboard. To make them look better, apply glue around the image and sprinkle some glitter. It is a bit messy, but it gives the cards a nice touch. I used a special type of scissors to cut the cardboard in a fancy pattern.
Back when I was a kid, we used to sprinkle common salt on the glue, to give the card a snowy effect. Oh, and we made our own glitter out of old Christmas globes, smashed and grounded as fine as possible. As I have only few of those old-style ornaments left and they're very precious to me, I could not afford to destroy any of them...
While I was at it, I decided to make a few tags for the Christmas presents. The thing is I spend a lot of time in the shops looking for presents, but somehow I always forget to buy small things, like tags, and it's quite annoying to have to make those too on Christmas Eve. Now, thanks to Steemit, I have a few of those too, as I intend to put everything way in my secret gift-hiding place as soon as I'm done taking photos. The little red tag with a teddy-bear on it is made for my son, as he's a teddy-bear collector!
This activity very cheap and easy, so it's suitable for children of all ages, at home or in the classroom. It's always a good idea to teach children they can make someone happy, too, their parents or their grandparents.
Teaching kids to be generous and thoughtful at an early age is important as it is something they will carry with them into adulthood.
Their partners in life and their kids will thank you for it someday!
Thanks for reading
