What To Do With Used Birthday And Holiday Cards
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Over the course of a year you can end up receiving lots of various cards. These cards may be for your birthday, celebratory occasions, get well wishes, the holidays, etc. After receiving a card and reading it, there are a few things that you are able to do with it after.
Used birthday and holiday cards can be recycled, turned into crafts, or donated.
Recycling
The most common next step after reading a card is to recycle it. By placing your old cards in your curbside recycling bin, it declutters your house, and moves on. However, there are a lot of other ways to get creative and give your old cards a new purpose.
Crafting
Instead of recycling your cards, you can turn them into crafts. To help you start brainstorming on craft ideas for all your old cards we have come up with a few ideas for you:
Make a new card
Most people only write on the inside right side of a card. Simply cut your card in half, along the fold. This will keep the pretty front of the card while having the backside be blank. You can either send the card as is with your message on the backside or glue this onto another piece of paper to make a new card.
Make gift tags
You can get as creative as you like here. Cut up the old card into sections that make sense for the design. If it’s a birthday card with a cake on the front, maybe you only cut out the cake, punch a hole in the top, and string it onto a gift bag. There are a ton of options here.
Make confetti
If you have a hole puncher, especially if you have a hole punch with a design such as a star or heart you can turn your cards into confetti. Simply hole punch the card wherever you like. The confetti can be used in pinatas, birthday cards you mail to other people, or really anywhere you use confetti.
Stock up your kid’s craft area
If you have children, chances are they have some art supplies. You can give them some more fun supplies but removing the written on parts of your old cards and letting them have at it.
Make a bookmark
By cutting your cards into strips you can turn them into whatever size bookmark you’d like!
Make an ornament
Cut out which part of the card you would like to turn into an ornament. Maybe it’s a Christmas tree on a Christmas card or maybe it’s a snowflake, whatever the case may be, cut out the design you’d like. Punch a hole in the top and string.
Create a paper chain
Cut your cards into one inch wide strips. Going strip by strip, fold into a circle, staple or tape shut. Take the next strip, string through the last circle, staple shut. Continue until you use up all your card strips or until the paper chain reaches your desired length.
Fold into a gift box
Grab a tutorial on Youtube and learn how to turn your old cards into a cute gift box. We like this tutorial here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccrYKkwh6-8
Create a book
Take the fronts of two cards that are identical in size. Ideally they will also match in some other way, such as by color or design. Cut 10-25 pages of paper into the same size as the cards or slightly smaller. Using a 3 hole punch, punch holes into all the pages in the same spot. Take some yarn and tie through the holes, creating a fun little book.
Donating
If you aren’t into crafting or don’t have the time, you can also donate your old cards. We have found a few places that will take used card donations. Be sure to carefully review the requirements set by each donation location before dropping off or mailing them your used cards.
St. Jude’s Ranch, not to be confused with St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital, is a nonprofit that supports abused and neglected children. They have a program where you can send them the fronts of your old cards: except for Hallmark, American Greetings, and Disney which they can’t accept due to copyright laws. You can also send them new cards with or without the envelopes. To learn more about this amazing program be sure to visit them online: https://stjudesranch.org/recycled-card-program/
Local Daycare, Nursery School, Elementary School, and/or Children’s Community Center
Collect a stack of your used cards, without any personal messages. Make sure the fronts of the cards are appropriate for all school children. Then contact the school, daycare, or community center you’d like to donate them to. Make sure they are willing and able to take your donation before showing up to their location with it.
The Hampton Virginia Clean City Commission puts on activities to teach community members how to reuse old cards by repurposing them into gift boxes. They accept all cards however they need both front and back attached. If there are personal messages inside the cards that you don’t want shared be sure to cross out those messages before sending to this organization.
Whether you chose to recycle, craft, or donate your used birthday and holiday cards, know it’s a better option than throwing them away in the trash. Finding ways to reuse and reduce waste is one of many steps towards living a more sustainable life.
At Copper Rabbit Crafts we are constantly striving to become more sustainable. And reusing what we can is definitely one of the ways we chose to become so. Let us know what you ended up doing with your old cards in the comments below!
