DIY scrap wood gift tags

At the beginning of the year, I was invited to join a wonderful group of bloggers for the Handmade Christmas Bloghop 2016 (thank you!).

The idea is to show everyone that you can actually make your own Christmas gifts (and finish them in time). It's true that in those last few weeks before December 25th we are all rushing to get everything done, but if you start early, you can actually accomplish a lot. You will save money, you will give people meaningful gifts made with love and you will not need to shop around for the perfect gift at the last minute. Hence the 12 months - 12 bloggers - 12 gifts idea. 

Every month one of the bloggers suggests one different handmade gift. And while I'm scheduled to post mine only in October, I wanted to use some of the ideas already posted to make some gifts too. 

Only, instead of a gift I made...gift tags. 

Here's the background story: 

Ever since Pili, from My Sweet Things, and Gail, from Purple Hues and Me, posted their Christmas decor ideas using scrap wood (you can see the complete list of projects so far at the bottom of this post), I've been meaning to make something similar.

But I had two problems. One, I had no scrap wood around. My grandfather used to work a lot with wood, but no one in the family inherited the talent (I certainly didn't), And two, decoupage is a technique I have never tried before. Not knowing if I was going to be successful, I also was not going to spend money buying wood.

But then my kids needed some canvas for a school project, and with the canvas came these bits of wood:

They were supposed to fir into the corners of the canvas' wood frames, to keep the angles straight, but were not really needed to the school project. Instead of throwing them out, I decided to use them. Because of their size, the only feasible alternative I could think of was to turn them into gift tags.

So...I glued them in groups of four, with a red ribbon in between:

And then printed a Merry Christmas message that could fit over the tags and glued it too.

I tried to distress the sides a bit, and though I was not entirely successful (probably because I used regular printer paper and didn't let it dry completely), I still like the rustic look of those tags.

Afterwards, I was thinking I probably could have stamped a few of them (instead of gluing the paper on top), and that's certainly on my list of things to try whenever I manage to find other similar bits of wood.

For now, I think these tags will perfectly complement those handmade Christmas gifts I'm planning to make!

Check below all the projects posted so far in the 2016 Handmade Christmas Blog Hop:

An InLinkz Link-up

Remember it's never too soon to start working on your Christmas projects!

And if you're into woodworking or looking for great beginner projects, here's a fun selection of projects:

27 Fun DIY Bandsaw Projects You Can Start Today

Happy Thursday,

Disclaimer: The link to the 27 Fun DIY Bandsaw Projects You Can Start Today is used in this post with the consent of its respective owner. All content within that link is also the responsibility of its respective owner.