Kid Made Christmas Napkins

By Alissa Marquess Zorn on December 6, 2014 (updated October 24, 2016)

The Creative Christmas Countdown continues with a Christmas craft that makes a great handmade gift- make Christmas napkins!

These cute holiday napkins are made by stamping on fabric with paint with cookie cutters. The kids and I made them together to give as gifts along with a jar of hot cocoa mix.

Materials Needed:

Cloth Napkins – the best material for stamping on is cotton. We made ours (by ripping muslin along the grain and then zig-zag stitching by the edge), but you can also buy either pre-made cloth napkins.
Acrylic paint -I chose to only bring out the red paint to keep the napkins looking holiday-ish and to simplify with the kids.
Shallow dish (or yogurt lids) to hold paint.
Cookie cutters – we used these mini ones from Walton
Vinyl table cloth or other cover to protect your work surface

Supplies - Fabric Stamping with Paint

How to Make Your Napkins:

Once you’re set up, this craft goes very quickly. In fact, you may wish to have some paper nearby so that kids who are very enthusiastic about stamping with the cookie cutters can keep on stamping after they’re done decorating the napkins.

1. Simply stamp on the fabric by dipping the cookie cutters in the paint.

2. Allow the paint to dry (over night, or if you are impatient like me, but blowing on it with a blow dryer – the blow dryer has the benefit of heat setting the paint.)

3. Set the paint using heat, either by ironing over it without steam (I would put a piece of parchment paper over it too to keep my iron safe from paint.) Or by putting napkins *once paint is dry* into the dryer for about 40 minutes.

Tips:

Show kids how to set the cookie cutters down with the paint side up after using them to avoid getting paint all over your work surface, and thus all over your napkins.
You may wish to show your kids how the napkins will look folded up for use so they can plan where they want to stamp.

We’re going to try out making these delicious looking hot cocoa truffles to give with the little stacks of holiday napkins for a cozy handmade gift this year. And I think we’ll need to keep 5 napkins for our own family to use with our picnic under the Christmas tree tradition.

Happy Holidays!