There are plenty of homemade card ideas out there, but how many of them are kid-friendly? We pulled this collection of homemade cards together for everyone who would like some inspiration for cards that kids can actually make themselves.

HOMEMADE CARDS THAT KIDS CAN MAKE THEMSELVES

If you’re familiar with Tinkerlab, you probably know that we appreciate child-centered projects, experiments, and open-ended creativity. So, for the most part, the cards shared here today have that spirit in their soul. These projects will give you a seed of an idea to start with. Once you set these card-making activities up, you can let your child get into their creative zone as they add their own ideas to the mix.

FIVE HOMEMADE CARD CATEGORIES

For easy navigation, these homemade cards are broken down into five categories: All Occasion Cards, Thank You Cards, Valentine Cards, Christmas and Hanukkah Cards, and Birthday Cards. But don’t let these categories dissuade you from mixing them up, as a Valentine card could easily become a Christmas card by swapping a heart shape for a tree. Thank you to all the blogs who let me share their homemade card ideas with us today!

ALL OCCASION CARDS FOR KIDS TO MAKE

• This is the homemade card that prompted this post: Easy Pop-Up Cards for Kids to Decorate (see photo)
• Lego Print Cards combine paint and your favorite Legos, The Imagination Tree
• Chicken Cards made from plates, The Mad House
• Fingerprint Cards, The Mad House
• Fall Tree Cards, The Chocolate Muffin Tree
• Make big watercolor paintings and then cut them up to create gorgeous Watercolor Notecards, Moomah the Magazine
• Colorful Tape Card, The Chocolate Muffin Tree
• Inspired Painting by Eric Carle, Sun Hats and Wellie Boots
• Watercolor Cards that kids can make, Paint on the Ceiling
• If your child likes to collage with pieces of paper, try these fun Monster cards, Red Ted Art
• Read about how Rebecca’s big plan to make Pumpkin cards was foiled by her kids who had other ideas in these Button Cards which are great for building fine motor skills, Here Come the Girls
• Diwali Card with Paper Scraps, Artsy Craftsy Mom
• Decorate a get well card with bandaids, googly eyes, and whatever else you can think of, Paging Fun Moms
• If making a digital card is more up your child’s alley, the KidZania Card-Making App is worth checking out, iGameMom

HOMEMADE THANK YOU CARDS

• The cut-out window on these Peek-a-boo Cards gives your child the opportunity to think about what to put behind the open space.
• If your child is around kindergarten age, introduce them to the joy of random acts of kindness such as sending a Thank You Card to service members. I love this. Coffee Cups and Crayons
• Her’s another act of kindness to leave happy greeting notes to brighten someone’s day. So Simple!, Coffee Cups and Crayons
• If you have a few thank you’s to write, check out these printable thank you cards with a blank area for your child to add a drawing and a few words of gratitude, The House of Hendrix
• Do you have a stock-pile of art that you’d like to repurpose into something new? Try these Mini-Masterpiece Thank You Cards, The Imagination Tree

HOMEMADE VALENTINE CARDS

• All-in-one Heart Envelope is such a cool way to fold a big cut-out heart into an envelope. Warning: these can be addictive.
• Heart Stencils with Dot Makers, Sun Hats and Wellie Boots
• Stained Glass Cards with Tissue Paper, Sun Hats and Wellie Boots
• How to set up a self-serve card-making station
• These gorgeous Painted Newspaper Heart Cards look like so much fun to make. Check this one out if you need to make a LOT of cards in one fell swoop, You are my Fave
• If you have some paint and a cookie cutter, you’re on your way to making Potato Print Heart Cards, The Imagination Tree
• Tissue Paper Heart Collage, Sun Hats and Wellie Boots

HOMEMADE HOLIDAY CARDS

• Stencil Tree Cards, The Mad House
• Styrofoam Print Christmas Cards will be frame-worthy keepsakes for their lucky recipients, The Artful Parent
• Leaf Rubbing Christmas Card, True Aim Parenting and Education
• Easy Christmas Tree Cards made with strips of shiny tape, Mama Pea Pod
• Tinfoil Collage Hannukah Cards, Scrumdilly-do
• Christmas Balls and Baubles Card, Red Ted Art
• Menorah Handprints, Little Learners Lounge
• We’re doing this for our holiday cards this year: Cut up artwork and turn them into tree shapes for this beautiful Christmas Tree Card, Lilla A
• Super simple Christmas cards made from cookie cutters and paint, Life at the Zoo
• Creating a Christmas Card Writing Area is designed with Christmas in mind, but you could apply this to any sort of card-making event, The Fairy and the Frog

HOMEMADE BIRTHDAY CARDS

• Birthday Card Collage, True Aim Parenting and Education
• Birthday Card made with Paper Straws, The Mad House
• I love the process behind these Whimsical Watercolor Cards, The Chocolate Muffin Tree
• Party Hat Birthday Card, Crafto Art

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In case you blinked and missed it, TinkerLab rounds up all the great stuff on the internets on keeping you and your critters creative and wraps it up for you in a tidy newsletter! (And throws in some secret giveaways for good measure!)  – Yuliya P., San Francisco, CA

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• How to simplify your life and make more room for creativity
• How to make hands-on making a part of your everyday life
• Easy, actionable ways to raise creative kids

Do you like to make your own cards? Today I’m sharing how to make pop-up cards with kids. These are easy, fun, and once kids get the hang of it it’s hard to stop making them.

Every now and then I’ll find myself in Target’s card aisle, lured in by my wide-eyed kids who ogle at the colorful greeting ideas. I love it too, but we’re rarely suckered in when it’s so easy, fun, and frankly more meaningful to make our own cards.

I know, making your own cards can takes heap-loaps of time, and the truth is that we don’t always have it. On the other hand, creative projects like this have some big benefits: they give my kids something constructive to work on and offer them lots of time to think about the recipient of their card (building lots of gratitude and love along the way).

My five-year old was getting ready for a couple of birthday parties, and she worked diligently on these pop-up cards. They can be as complicated or simple as you like. Since making these cards, this has become her favorite card-making method, and most recently she made a princess card with a pop-up crown for a friend’s dress-up party.

POP-UP CARD SUPPLIES

• Card Stock or other heavy-weight paper
• Colorful construction paper
• White Glue
• Scissors
• Crayons
• Envelope

HOW TO MAKE A POP-UP CARD

CUT THE CARD STOCK FOR THE POP-UP CARD

Cut a piece of card stock to the desired size.

Next, fold the card stock in half. Cut two parallel slits on the folded side of the paper, about one inch apart and about one inch long. I’d encourage you to play around with the length of these cuts.

Next, fold the tab up and crease it.

Open up your card.

And then pop the paper toward the inside of the card.

INVITE YOUR CHILD TO CREATE A POP-UP CARD

Cut a piece of colorful construction paper, the same size or slightly bigger than the card stock. Glue the card stock to the construction paper. Be sure that you don’t glue the “pop-up” section down.

Set up the blank pop-up card and a bucket of crayons as an invitation for your child to create.

MAKE THE POP-UP DESIGN FOR YOUR CARD

Ask your child to think of what he or she would like to pop off of the card. My five-year old made two cards: one had a space theme and the other had a garden theme. She decided that she wanted a rocket to pop off the space card and a flower to pop off the garden card. I helped her figure out how tall to make these objects.

Note: If the pop-up objects are too tall, they’ll poke out of the card when it closes

Decorate the cards with crayons, markers, or colored pencils. When the card is done, glue the pop-up piece in place and let it dry for about an hour.

MORE CREATIVE CARDS FOR KIDS

Check back tomorrow for a GIANT collection of open-ended and process-based cards that kids can make. Until then, here are a few more ideas to keep you busy…

FREE template for a pop-up paper giraffe and elephant

The Chocolate Muffin Tree shares the same technique shared here, with some additional ideas on what to add to the pop-up area: How to make a simple pop-up.

Similar to pop-up cards, try making a peek-a-boo card.

If you like handprint cards, this handprint card from Willowday is really unique.