What do you do with old Christmas cards? I am sentimental about them and so it is hard to just throw them away. Any advice?

If I receive a card that is a picture or handmade I keep them. But the normal cards that people buy on sale and then just sign their name in...I toss at the end of the year. I have a keep sake box that I put the special cards in so I can look back years to come.

HTH

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Tracy S
Mommy to 5 little girls
Victoria
Alyssa
Samantha & Selena
Malaya
Tracy_s5girls@yahoo.com

not really.

maybe you can make post cards for next year??

i remember in grade school, we made ornaments from them.

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I keep the picture cards, but most of the rest, I cut off the front and give them to whatever organization is wanting them. St. Jude's used to collect them, but I don't know if they do any more. My DS's preschool teacher collects them and saves them for next year for the kids to use for crafts, so I'll probably send mine to her this year.

I do keep a few from family members who have written something in them.

Sarah......mom to Jason & Devin

I give them to someone who belongs to an organization - they cut the pictures out, punch a hole in the top, and thread it........GREAT Gift Tags!!!!

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I sometimes cut out the pictures to use for gift tags, but my grandmother died last year and she probably had enough gift tags to last the rest of my life. My Christmas cards will go in the recycle trash probably this weekend.

Lisa

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I also cut them with different pattern scissors and make gift tags.

I love the gift tag idea! This is one of those times when I say, "Now, why didn't I think of that?"

Okay, now that I've gotten such great ideas on Christmas cards, I must ask... What do you all do with wedding cards (yes, I've been married for 17 years and still have the cards), baby cards (oldest is 13... yes, have cards), and birthday cards (TONS of these!)???

I guess that having had our house flooded when I was in 7th grade and losing all of my belongings has made me extremely sentimental and somewhat of a packrat as far as this type of thing. I hold on to too much but it's time to clean up a little bit??? Maybe??? I have it all very well organized in plastic tubs but haven't looked at any of them since the day we got them... Sad, huh? My justification has always been that they don't take up much room but they honestly are starting to!!!

I make gift tags out of mine for next Christmas. I use my scrapbooking scissors to make cool edging designs and then I use a hole punch so I can attach the tag with a ribbon. I haven't bought any store bought tags in several years.

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I keep all the cards we get, Christmas and Birthday and everything lol.. We only get cards from my grandparents, aunt and uncle though... I figure some day they won't be there to send cards and it'll be nice to have. They usually include a letter and picture or write in the card, too.

All my wedding cards are with my wedding stuff in a special trunk I bought right after we were married (we've been married 18 years). All the baby cards are in the girls baby books. I only keep birthday cards, mother day cards, anniversary cards, etc. from DH & DDs, the rest go in the recycle bin. I used to put all the girls birthday cards in the baby books, but they are full now. I have a shoe box in each girls room where I put all their cards. I will give them to them at some point later and they can do what they want with them. Christmas cards as I stated above -I will cut out some of the cute pictures for gift tags, then they all go in the recycle bin.

Lisa

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"It's not having what you want,
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Hello, Cuthie!

I have saved all my wedding cards - I could never get rid of them, either. I've been thinking of sticking them in a scrapbook. I still enjoy looking at them, and reading the nice messages!

My mom saved all my cards from when I was born. I am so glad she saved them, and gave them to me as an adult (kept in a shoe box).

However, any cards that are regular yearly birthday cards - they get tossed. Wedding and new baby cards are saved - nothing else. Oh - the exception is that I save all Christmas cards with photos. The photos go into an album. Cards get tossed.

I scan front and back, along with the envelope. We don't have the space to keep so many and with it stored on the hard drive (backed up regularly) I don't feel so bad throwing every single card out.

You could do a scrapbook of cards...

I think this year I am only going to save one of them - the rest go in the trash. When I was younger I used to save EVERY card I received. Now that I'm older and moving about once a year I try to maintain a more minimalist lifestyle

These days you could just scan your favorites and save them on a picture disk with your holiday shots.

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Thank you for all of the suggestions.

What I ended up doing was writing a list of people that I sent cards to that did not send cards to us (!), sent cards to that did send cards to us, and did not send cards to that sent cards to us! Confused yet?

I then threw out all of this year's uglies that had no personalized notes and kept those with personalized notes and/or photos rubber banded together with the list above. I'll read through them before we do next year's cards and will send cards to EVERYONE on the list that I kept.

I went through previous years' cards and did similar but cut out gift tags from pretties after setting aside all of them with personalized notes. I must have thrown out a few hundred and only kept about 100 so it really is better this way.

See, there is a method to my organization. LOL.

I like your idea of making a "future card list." I have a short memory and end up just going through my address book. That's a lot of wasted stamps!

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I keep the ones from my DH, they usually have a long handwritten note in them. It's fun to go back over the years and read the messages and what was going on in our lives at that time.

Some with pics that I love I have framed to hang for the holidays others have been used in scrapbooking and some the kids have used in to make cards for the family...... I have one huge picture 11 x 13 that we made a collage of pics from cards.....nobody ever believes they are old Christmas cards....the rest go in the trash

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O-H-I-O

I keep them then the next year I cut the fronts off and use them for decorating big plain handle type shopping bags to deliver presents in. I have also used them for decorating large presents by plastering them all over the front or top of the box. (keep the cards whole until you use them so you don't accidentally give them back to the same person)

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We use Christmas cards, birthday cards..all kinds of cards in our Children's Church and our Daycare. They make cards for the local hospital and package tags that they sell to raise money for the "Courtesy Baskets" at that same hospital. (there are baskets in the ICU waiting rooms and we fill them will snacks and magazines every Thursday)

This time of year is a windfall for us but we never have enough. Last year one of the ladies bought boxes of cards for 25 cents each but did not find them this year.

We LOVE old greeting cards!!

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