DIY Christmas Card Holder

This post and shop for this DIY Christmas Card Holder has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. 

#MerryAndBright #CollectiveBias

Yay! It's almost Christmastime, y'all. I broke allllll of my usual traditions and decorated the house before Thanksgiving...and I'm kind of loving it. This DIY Christmas Card Holder is one of my new Christmas items this year...put together by the husband and painted by me. See the complete tutorial for it below.

This wall off the kitchen area and family room had been empty since we moved in last March. It's not a high traffic area, so I kind of wasn't sure what to do with it. I thought about a floor to ceiling chalkboard (I miss the one from our old house), but this area gets very little natural light and would probably seem cave-ish. So, we built this DIY Christmas Card Holder to hang here during the holiday season...and I'm even thinking after the holidays it can double as the "stuff I don't want magnetted to the refrigerator" holder. It's in the perfect spot for "family stuff"! And Christmas cards definitely fall under that category. See how this came together below.

Before I share the DIY Christmas Card Holder tutorial, I want to share some Christmas card finds...and thoughts on the Christmas card tradition, in general.

Y'all, I'm a little sad to admit it, but for the last two years I had given up on sending out traditional Christmas cards. Between my book deal and work and kids, things got busy. I had this fun idea of doing new year's cards instead...and then new years came and went and well...you see where I'm going, here. 

And then I received a card from a friend last year who genuinely told me how much she missed our card. Her family had a special tradition with all of their cards and she was sad that there was a hole where our card had always been in their life. As her family received cards every day during the holidays, they would pray over the senders of the card that evening at dinner. It touched me so much. I've decided to dive back into Christmas card sending...and can't wait to fill my DIY Christmas Card holder with all of the cards that come our way, as well.

My mother has always had a wonderful Christmas card display...this card holder of mine is my version of a tradition she always upheld...displaying the well wishes from others in our life.

This year, I'm using American Greetings cards from Walmart. They have such a beautiful selection...even fun stickers to seal my envelopes (my sister-in-law uses stickers on the outside and confetti on the inside...she gets me every time).

Besides greeting cards, American Greetings also has an incredible selection of gift wrap, tissue paper, and bags to help all of us celebrate and connect with family, friends, neighbors and co-workers this holiday season.

Click here for a fabulous Ibotta deal on American Greetings products.

They even have packaged sets if you're sending out quite a few cards. 

You can also grab this Tinsel the Bear for $3.47 with the purchase of 3 American Greetings cards. 

I also grabbed a small American Greetings gift bag and some Fun Size M&Ms to package up and surprise our mail lady with...she's always so kind! I want to be sure to gift her some sweets this holiday season (nothing says "You're awesome" like a bag full of delicious chocolate...amiright?). 

This type of package would also be fun to ELF someone with, too! American Greetings has a fun, free Elfing printable for you to include in your Elf bag with instructions, a poem, and small sign for people to hang on their door after they’ve been “Elfed”. Click here to grab it.

Click below for the:
American Greetings #MerryAndBright Sweepstakes

Here are my directions for the DIY Christmas Card Holder:

Supplies:

• prefinished moulding for the frame (use your own dimensions that fit best in your space)
• flat "L" brackets (4-8)
• screws that are short enough to not pierce through your moulding
• short staples for a staple gun
• wire mesh to fit within the size of frame you're planning to make
• not pictured: wood glue, wood filler 

Our outer size of our frame is 3'x5' (which was also the exact dimensions of the wire mesh we purchased). I will be going off of our sizes for this tutorial, but feel free to customize this to whatever size works best for you.

We cut two moulding pieces to three foot widths and two to five foot widths. We made 45-degree cuts on our moulding board ends to create the corners of our frame. The longest side of each board matches our final dimensions of our frame.

We used wood glue to connect the corners and then the L brackets on the backside.
After attaching these, let them dry overnight. If your frame feels wobbly or unstable, you can use two L brackets in each corner.

After the glue was dry, I liberally rubbed my wax puck over the white pre-finish of the moulding. This is to allow the paint to easily sand off and this white layer to show through. If you don't have a wax puck, you can use the side of a taper candle in this same manner.

I also filled my corners with wood filler. 
Then I painted the entire piece with red chalk-style paint.

After the paint dried, I sanded the entire piece with a course-grit sandpaper.
This weathered nicely thanks to the wax puck layer from earlier.

Then, my husband stapled the mesh all around the frame.

We probably used 100+ staples to make sure that thing was on there!

We actually hung this frame through the wire mesh holes! ;)
And I used mini clothespins to attach all of our cards.
I thought my Buon Natale (Merry Christmas in Italian) sign was perfect with this piece.

I can't wait until the Christmas season is in full swing and this DIY Christmas Card Holder is filled up!

Check out more holiday fun here.

Neglect your chores like me and don't miss a thing:

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