Merry Mailbox

Note: Illustration on assembly at bottom of page.

Materials: Thick cardboard; poster cardboard; gift-wrap paper—one sheet of green, another of red; scrap of red construction paper; wide cardboard tube about 5 inches high; plastic or silk poinsettias or holly; gold paper edging; Christmas cards with greeting on front; rubber cement; scissors; ruler; pencil; sticky tape.

Directions:

1. Cut thick cardboard 7 inches x 7 inches. Cover with red gift wrap. Cover tube—to be used as mailbox stand—with same color wrap. Glue tube, centered, to cardboard square.

2. Cut thick cardboard 12 inches x 6 inches and poster cardboard 12 inches x 15 inches.

3. Attach poster cardboard to base with sticky tape strips, curving the thin cardboard to form the mailbox. Place mailbox, open end down, on a piece of heavy cardboard.

4. With pencil, trace around the open end of the mailbox. Cut out the shape and cut another like it. Tape one shape to the open end of the mailbox to seal it. Cover outside of mailbox with green gift wrap.

5. Glue mailbox to top of tube. Glue gold trim around ends of mailbox. Tape the second end piece like a door hanging open to the open end of mailbox.

6. Cut cardboard into flag shape. Cover both sides with red construction paper. Glue to side of mailbox. Glue cards as shown in photo above.

7. To trim base, make a hole in make a hole in tube to hold stem of each poinsettia or holly branch.