Craft Personalized Postcards

What You Need:

• Stack of 4" x 6" photographs
• Glue sticks
• White poster board
• Postcard stamps
• Pens
• Scissors
• Paint markers

What You Do:

1. Have your child select a photograph from the stack. It can feature anything from her at an important event, to her pet dog, to a favorite landmark or view. If you don't want to use the original photograph, simply make a color copy of the picture.
2. Next, ask her to turn the photograph face-down on the large poster  board, and trace the picture. If she wishes to make multiple postcards at once, have her mount and trace several different photographs on the poster board.
3. You or another adult can then cut out the traced rectangle of poster board.
4. Invite her to use a glue stick to paste the photo to the poster board.
5. Once the photo has been attached to the poster board, ask her to decorate the photos using the paint markers. Help her avoid drawing on the people in the photos—instead, try adding a frame of dots around the border, or fun squiggly lines around a person in the photo. This is her chance to let her creativity shine!
6. Now, let the postcard decorations dry, and ask her to decide who to send the postcard to, and what message she'd like to write on the postcard. The perfect postcard message is short, yet still conveys feelings. Having trouble? Ask her to describe how the photo makes her feel, then help her turn that feeling into a short phrase that she can write on the back.
7. Finally, fill in the recipient’s name and address. Ask her to add the stamps.
8. Bring her to the mailbox or post office to send off her postcard. It'll only be a matter of days before the lucky recipient receives his personalized postcard!