Sticker Shock

I'm suffering from sticker shock. The girls and I are picking up a birthday present at the toy store, and they snap up first one, then two, then five strips of stickers hanging near the register.

They're so cute. They take up hardly any space in the shopping basket. They can't cost much, right? Wrong.

The price of those little cellophane packets adds up faster than our Black Lab can snatch an abandoned P.B. & J.

We put the stickers back, with the consolation of launching a make-your-own version that I remembered from an old magazine article. It involved punching circles in craft paper, then painting their backs with a mixture of gluey-water. Let's just say it was more mess than success, and not something I'd endeavor to do on a regular basis.

Then I stumbled on a compromise: buying office labels that the kids can decorate themselves with markers. The labels come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, and they're much easier on the wallet than the finished product. Plus, the process inspires a whole lot more creative juice than peeling off a backing and slapping it on whatever's handy – a book, your sister, the car door.

Some days the girls get into a mandala vibe and cover the white space with colorful patterns. Other days, things get personal and the stickers feature their names or initials. And of course they churn out plenty with stars, hearts, smiley faces, and animals.

If they're looking for something a little fancier, we make homemade printable stickers on the computer, using the same office labels.

Still, it's hard to resist the real thing now and then. So now we splurge on stickers that really stand out. Last summer, I logged onto kodakgallery.com and had snapshots of Caitlin and Ellie cannon-balling into the neighbors' pool made into photo stickers for their birthday. You can imagine the splash they made. And to me, it's worth the cash to stretch the use of a priceless image.

For their next birthday, I'm ordering custom stickers from www.pikmepapers.com with whimsical designs (Ellie's has to be an elephant, Caitlin's a monkey) and their names or monograms. I'm hoping for a rebound effect: inspiration for homemade thank-you notes and letters to cousins. Wouldn't it be great if that would stick, too?