How to Make Journal Cards

Choose papers creatively when making your own journal cards

Many people like to keep journals. In journals, they write down personal thoughts and memories, keeping them to look back on later and share with loved ones. Journal cards work in a similar way, but instead of writing these thoughts and memories down inside of a blank book, they write them down on small paper cards. These cards can be simple index cards or elaborately decorated pieces of art. These easy to make cards can then be sorted and kept together by date or placed into scrapbooks.

Things You'll Need

• Index cards or other paper cards that have a uniform size
• Material to decorate paper, such as rubber stamps and ink, glitter or stickers

Instructions

1. Decide how you want to incorporate your thoughts and memories onto your cards. You don't always have to do this the same way, but you may want some form of consistency. The simplest journal cards are straightforwardly written on, dated and filed. More elaborate journal cards incorporate decorations.

2. Use rubber stamps or stickers to add a border to your rubber card. You can also use them to add headers. Craft stores sell stamps and stickers with themes centered on holidays and celebrations such as weddings and even a child's first day of school. You can turn your journal card into a one-page scrapbook with these options.

3. Write your journal thought on one side of the card, then decorate the other. Or, you can incorporate your writing into the design scheme, illustrating the journal card with stamped-on illustrations, cut-out photos or mementos from the memory you're writing about, such as theater ticket stubs or wedding menus. You can even use paper mementos like these as the actual journal card, scrapbooking and writing around or directly on top of the main text. Use different types and colors of pens and markers.

4. Embellish your journal card as elaborately as you'd like. Use needle and thread to attach buttons, ribbon or other small mementos. Use regular white glue to attach photos that you've cut out to fit on your journal card.

5. Keep your cards in collections. You can keep them by date, putting 1 month's cards together in a decorated envelope. You can punch holes in a corner or centered at the top of each card, then slide them on a metal ring so you can flip through them. You can also glue them into a scrapbook and further embellish the pages around the cards, or slide them into sheet protectors or photo album sleeves so you can view the cards' fronts and backs.

Tips & Warnings

• You can make several journal cards of one theme and send them to family and friends as postcards and holiday cards.

Resources

• Pixie's Gallery of Journal Cards
• Examples of Journal Cards at Scrapbook Doodle