DIY Recipe Card Holder

Recipe Card Holder Craft

10/10/2018

DIY Recipe Card Holder

When you're in the kitchen cooking up a storm, sometimes it's hard to keep your recipe cards clean. Accidents happen and things can get messy, especially when little kids are helping out! When my girls were little, I had SO many empty baby food bottles and I didn't want to throw them away. There HAD to be something we could use them for! I started buying baby food in those little plastic containers with the lids and they came in handy to store a variety of small things such as beads, safety pins, buttons and much more. The question still remained....What do you do with the left over glass bottles?

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Recipe Card Holder DIY craft by Crafting Friends Designs

My daughter and I came up with a fun idea. Turn them into card holders! We got out all our craft supplies (and purchased TONS more!) and went to work.
We had a BLAST coming up with as many different looks as we could possibly think of. I wish I had photos of the gift baskets we created but that's been so many years ago that I either didn't take photos or they're in the stacks of memory cards that I have. I hope that you'll enjoy creating some card holders of your own!

Recipe Card Holder Supplies

1. Regular sized baby food bottle cleaned out and with a lid
2. Paint
3. 6" Dowls (I bought the 12" dowls and cut them in 1/2)
4. Hot glue gun
5. Cement
6. 2" Craft Clothespins
7. Scissors and wire cutters
8. Small craft supplies of your choice (wood shapes, miniature hats, flowers, ropes, birds, butterflies, etc)

How to make your own Recipe Card Holder

To start, drill a hole in the center of the baby food jar lid big enough for the dowl to fit through. Paint the lid, dowl and clothespin the color you prefer and let dry.

Mix a small amount of cement thick enough to hold the dowl in place and pour into bottle. This helps hold the stick tight and keeps the bottle from tipping over. Place dowl in center of cement in bottle making sure it is straight.

Once the cement set up completely, slide the lid onto the dowl and tighten to bottle.

Next, decide what you want around the bottle to decorate it. I found some bamboo placemats on clearance to make some fall holders. I placed the jar on the placemat to see where I needed to cut it and cut to the height I wanted and length needed to wrap all the way around the bottle with regular scissors. Then I glued the cut bamboo strip to the bottle with a hot glue gun.

Christmas recipe card holder DIY craft by Crafting Friends Designs

Another option that I really liked was the white picket fence. In order to help this stick, I cut a strip of fabric and glued it around the jar. This helped hold the various decorations too. Then, I cut the fence with wire cutters to the size needed and hot glued it to the fabric around the jar. Try to place the glue behind the fence enough so you don't see the mess when you're finished.

Cowboy Recipe Card Holder DIY Craft by Crafting Friends Designs

The 3rd option that we used was short craft sticks. We painted them first and let them dry. For this option, we also glued a strip of fabric around the jar to help the sticks hold. As you're gluing the craft sticks for this, make sure they are straight up and down. It's easy for them to tilt a little and then you end up with a big gap or having to start over.

Daisy Recipe Card Holder DIY Craft by Crafting Friends Designs

Decorating your Recipe Card Holder

Now comes the fun part! The options are endless when it comes to decorating the bottles. Have fun with it!

This one used the Bamboo placemat around the bottle, sea shells on the lid and wooden flip flops and sun to finish it.

Beach Recipe Card Holder DIY Craft by Crafting Friends Designs

For this one, we used a 2" candle holder wreath from JoAnn's, a few extra fabric flowers, berries and a dragonfly charm

Flower Recipe Card Holder DIY Craft by Crafting Friends Designs

Whether you choose to use these holders for recipe cards, inspirational quotes or to hold grocery lists, it's fun to keep or give as gifts!
I like to make a batch of homemade cookies or include a small package of cookie mix along with crocheted kitchen towel or scrubbies and set everything up in a gift basket for neighbors and friends.