Christmas Junk Journal Printables: Tags, Labels & Paper
A Christmas junk journal is the easiest one to fill. For a month the post brings cards, every gift comes with a tag, and the kitchen is covered in recipes. All the journal has to do is catch them before the recycling does.
What it needs from you is the background: pages, a few pockets and a handful of tags to write on. This page lists the nine Christmas sets in our catalogue and says what each one is for, then gives six pages to make in December.
Quick answer: to make a Christmas junk journal from printables you need background paper, tags and labels to write on, and a pocket or two. The nine sets below cover all three: two kits with 8 pages of vintage tags and labels, and seven paper sets with 115 sheets, in vintage parchment, blue watercolor, navy and gold, and bright red and green.
Christmas tags, labels and pages to write on
Start here. Tags and labels are where the writing goes: who the gift was from, what was in the box, what the day was like.
Christmas Tags Labels Junk Journal Kit
Three pages of tags and one of labels, with holly, poinsettia, pine sprigs, red bows and a few old-fashioned Santas on cream tones. The tags come in three sizes: small ones for tucking into pockets, medium ones with a single sprig each, and large framed tags with room for a few written lines. The labels are long and narrow, the shape that fits across an envelope flap.
Christmas Junk Journal Tags Labels Craft
Four pages of labels: wreaths with red bows, holly and berries, and blank labels in red, green and gold frames. Every label has an empty middle, so each one is a place to write a name, a date or a title. The plain framed pages also work after the holidays, for the rest of winter.
Antique Christmas Scrapbook Paper
Twelve aged parchment sheets where the decoration sits in the corners and the centre is left empty. They are ready-made pages for a letter, a recipe, a photo or the Christmas dinner menu.
Vintage and botanical Christmas paper
Vintage Christmas Paper
Forty-eight papers with deer among pines, holly and berries, golden bells, baubles, a knitted stocking and white deer on red plaid. Several sheets are patchworks of small squares: cut them apart and one page becomes a dozen little pictures for tags and pockets.
Christmas Floral Seamless Patterns
Three watercolor patterns of winter bouquets on white: red poinsettia, cotton bolls with pine, and eucalyptus with soft peach flowers. Muted greens, greys and berry red, for a quiet botanical Christmas. All three share one palette and mix on one spread.
Christmas Scrapbook Paper Blue Winter
A calm blue Christmas in place of the usual red and green: snowy fir trees, snowflakes, a reindeer in the forest, ornaments, berries and folk flowers. Many motifs come twice, on a light ground and on a dark one. One sheet printed at 300 DPI is about 6 5/8 × 10 inches, enough to cover a page of an A5 or half-letter journal with a little to trim.
Snowflakes, peppermint and cheerful patterns
Snowflake Digital Papers
Large and small snowflakes with diagonal stripes, a chevron, wide stripes and a checkerboard. The palette is navy, light blue and gold, so the papers last past Christmas: New Year cards, January pages, a winter birthday.
Digital Paper Winter Holiday
Peppermint candies, strings of lights and “ho ho ho” lettering, each on a light ground and on a bold one, with polka dots, a chevron, a lattice and stripes as companions.
Cute Christmas Seamless Pattern Bundle
Eight patterns full of characters: cats in wreaths, dachshunds by the tree, a snowy village with cars carrying trees, a baking kitchen, farm animals in scarves and cowboy Santas, plus a pastel pair with reindeer and gingerbread. The ones to choose for a family journal or for pages about the pets.
Six Christmas junk journal pages to make in December
Each of these needs one background sheet, a tag or a label, and something you would have thrown away.
- Gift tag keepsakes. Save the tags from the gifts you received. Under each, write what was inside.
- Christmas card corner. Cut the fronts from the cards you were sent and keep the handwritten lines.
- Wrapping paper swatches. A small square of every wrapping paper in the house this year, labelled by gift.
- December in a pocket. One small note per day in December, all in one pocket.
- Cookie recipe envelope. The family cookie recipe on a card in an envelope, flour marks welcome.
- Letter to next December. What you want to remember and what to do differently. Seal it until next year.
More prompts for the rest of the year are in 53 Junk Journal Ideas for Pages, Pockets and Prompts, and the Idea Generator picks one for you with a layout.
A small Christmas journal in one evening
- Print five background sheets on ordinary paper, on both sides if you like. Mix one busy pattern with two quiet ones.
- Fold the sheets in half and nest them into one booklet. That is twenty pages, close to one for each day until Christmas.
- Staple or stitch along the fold.
- Print one page of tags and one of labels on light cardstock and cut them out.
- Make two pockets and one envelope with the Envelope & Pocket Template Maker: it draws the outline in the size of your journal, to print on the back of a patterned sheet.
- Glue a pocket inside the front cover for loose finds, and leave the rest of the pages empty. December will fill them.
Printing notes
- The two kits are Letter size and print one to one.
- Most of the paper sets are 12 × 12 inches. On a Letter or A4 printer choose “Fit to page” for the whole sheet at about 8 × 8 inches, or 100% for a full-scale piece of the pattern.
- Papers with corner decoration, like the Antique Christmas set, need “Fit to page” so the corners are not cut off.
- Tags and labels last longer on light cardstock; journal pages fold better on ordinary paper.
- Home inkjet prints can smudge when wet. Use a glue stick or double-sided tape on them.
Questions about Christmas junk journal printables
What is a Christmas junk journal?
A handmade booklet that collects the paper of the season: gift tags, card fronts, wrapping paper, recipes, tickets, with a line of writing next to each. Some people keep one page a day through December.
When should I start?
Print and bind in November, so the pages are ready on the first of December. The journal itself is filled during the month and finished in the quiet days after Christmas.
Can I use the tags as gift tags?
Yes. Print them on cardstock, punch a hole and add string. Afterwards the same tags can go back into the journal with a note about the gift.
Do the papers work for cards and gift wrap too?
The designers list cards, invitations, gift wrap and scrapbook layouts for these sets. For wrapping, a home-printed sheet covers a small box; the seamless patterns can be repeated for larger sizes.
More for the season
The printable sets on this page are made by independent designers and hosted on Creative Fabrica. Downloading is free with their free trial: a payment card is needed to start it, and you can cancel the subscription at any time. Each set has its own page here with every sheet shown before you download.
PNG DIY may earn a commission when you sign up with Creative Fabrica through the links on our pages, at no cost to you. See our affiliate disclosure.
