My two year old, Grace, loves to play with stickers. She doesn’t care what they look like or how they look once they are on the paper. The fun is the novelty of peeling and placing each sticky piece.
Since Grace couldn’t care less what the stickers look like, I’ve gotten a little creative.
3 Creative Free Sticker Options for Toddlers:
1. Calendar Reminders: Recently I received an extremely ugly, free promotional calendar in the mail. Before I threw it away (Yes, it was even too ugly to make envelopes out of it!) I snatched the sheet of reminder stickers that came with it. Grace loved picking out which sticker design to use next and didn’t care at all that the stickers said things like “Meeting” and “Car Maintenance.”
2. Postage Stamps: I am not suggesting that you let a toddler use postage stamps for stickers. However, some sheets of stamps come with a large sticker of the image that is on the stamps. Instead of tossing the sheet when the stamps are gone, slip it into your sticker stash.
3. Address Labels: After we moved into our new house, I had a lot of address labels leftover from our old address. Many address labels have a decoration printed before the address. I cut off the decoration and threw away the text. This is also a good idea for the free address labels that are sent with donation requests if you don’t care for the design of the labels.
I realize that the cost of stickers doesn’t have to break the bank. We just bought Grace a pack of 104 for only $0.98. Still I think there is value in letting my daughter recycle something that normally would be headed straight for the trash.
What ideas do you have for free stickers?
Trader Joe’s always gave out stickers when we lived close to one. Also, Melissa & Doug just came out with some pretty sweet “colorform” style reusable stickers that my kids have been digging. When I read this, though, I realized somewhere along the way, my girls have more or less traded sticker-love for scissors & glue. I think I would prefer the stickers though… recently found a bag of chocolate chips carefully hidden in the back of the pantry, hacked open with the tell tale marks of little safety scissors!
Love these suggestions! I’m forever holding onto random sticker-y things for just this reason. 🙂 When I lined my shelves recently, I also kept all the white contact paper scraps. My little ones loved making “custom stickers” with it.
I’m really big on the Easter Seals stickers that come in the mail with donation requests. They’re beautiful.
I’ve never gotten those before. Lucky you!