Cardmaking

Tips For Easy Handmade Thank You Cards & Tags

Create your own easy handmade thank you cards & tags with these tips and ideas!

Hi Friends! Kelly here to share a couple ideas for making thank you cards and tags now that the holidays are over. Aside from thanking people who gave you gifts this year, you may also consider thanking those who hosted a party you attended, those who helped you bake cookies, or even the delivery people who worked hard to bring packages to your door all season long. There may be quite a few people on your list to thank, so I’d like to offer a few tips on making holiday thank yous:

Use a winter theme. It always feels great to get more use out of the holiday sets you buy, so turn to these sets for your inspiration. You can save the Santa stamps for making Christmas cards, but there are probably more neutral images to pick from in the set, like a snowman.
Pick a design that’s easy to replicate. After all the holiday card-making, crafting, cooking, entertaining, shopping, present-wrapping, elf-on-the-shelf management, etc, laboring over involved thank yous is a tall order. Give yourself a break and go for simple cards with one special element to vary.
Consider making thank you tags instead of cards. Due to their small size, they are often more quick to make.

I used these tips for the thank yous in this post…

I picked the adorable snowman from Essentials by Ellen Holiday Characters to featured in each of the projects. These snowman heads are perfect not only because the shape is simple to cut out, but also because snowmen are white. Which, like the polar bears, means no need to color! I stamped several snowman heads on a scrap piece of paper and colored all the noses and cheeks. Then I was only left with deciding what color each hat will be. You may have noticed I did not ink up the ball on top of the hat. This is where my special element will be!

I’ve made four tags (all using the Essentials by Ellen Shipping Tags die, Totally Random Sayings, Vol. 3, and Lawn Fawn Snowy Day Remix to keep things simple) with four different hat accessories …

1) Pom Poms. Normally I don’t use thick embellishments like this on a card, but it totally works for a tag! Love the texture and the softness.

The bottom of the tag is stamped with a border stamp from Winterscapes. Did you notice the top of this tag has a reinforced hole? I made my own with a 3/4″ circle punch. It’s a nice way to add another layer and color in your project.

As a side note, the Nesting EK Success circle punches are my favorite. The bases are all a similar size, but more importantly, they lock in a closed position so they are very thin and easy to store.

2) Tiny dies. This adorable star happens to be from the Letterboard Essentials die set, but anything would work here. There’s an asterisk from this set that I was considering as well.

I used one of Jennifer McGuire’s recent tips for this tag, and started with a colored piece of pink cardstock. Then I blended a darker pink ink on the bottom. Much less work than inking the entire tag!

3) Jingle Bell. So adorable! And a bonus … it makes noise!

I used a needle and thread to attach the bell to the tag and just tied the thread together on the other side to secure the bell.

4) Shaker Embellishments. For this one I combined two elements, the large snowflake from the Snow Flurries Mix, Essentials by Ellen Embellishments and a droplet from Essentials by Ellen Embellishments, Colored Light Droplets.

These are so economical when you only use one embellishment from the pack. Look how pretty the droplet is! For the background on this tag I stamped the solid circle from Winterscapes.

Here they all are! A set of these would make a cute and useful gift!

My husband’s grandma just passed away a few months ago, but this is definitely something she would have loved to receive. She didn’t need any more jewelry, sweets, or candles, but she was always sending cards and giving presents.

So what do you use the tags for?

I paired them with the clever little Essentials by Ellen Bon Bon Box. They were so easy to coordinate since I used patterned papers from the same pack. Curious what’s inside?

These treat boxes are the PERFECT size for a peanut butter blossom cookie. Which is convenient, because I definitely need to start getting rid of more sweets from my house!

Before putting my cookies in the box, I lined the bottom with a square piece of wax paper so the cookie grease does not get into the paper. Again, this box is just the perfect size!

Finally, I did make one thank you card with the snowman heads. This one uses the “thank you” from That Think You Did. I even added a special element to the hat.