Gift Bag

I found this idea while I was browsing crafty web sites and immediately fell in love with it. Relatively simple to make, this little goodie bag sure catches eye fast. I had few people asking me for instructions so here is how you can make your own.

Start with 4 1/2 x 4 1/2 cardstock. It will be covered with the pattern paper so it doesn't have to be any fancy stuff, regular single color square is just perfect. Ccore 1 inch along each side and then score diagonal lines in the squares that were created by the first scoring. I know it sounds weird so here is a diagram I created as visual aid. All the lines are scored.



Once you have all the scoring done, crease the box along the 1 inch lines and then fold the corners in. I used glue dots to stick the pointy corners to the the sides but other type of adhesive will also work fine. This will create a small box, the foundation of your bag.

As the next step cut a pattern paper (or plain paper if you desire) to be 5 1/2 x 11 inches.

Add adhesive to the very bottom of one of the longer sides. You want something with nice strong hold. "Sticky Strip" or double sided tape seems to work well.

Now take your premade box and wrap the pattern paper around it. Keep the egdes of your box and the bottom of your paper even. Pretty much you don't want to overlap the paper since it would decrease stabily and you don't want to have the paper too high since it would show part of the box underneath.

Just before you are ready to wrap the last part apply same adhesive to one of the shorter sides of you pattern paper and bring the edges together.

This gives you the base for your project that you can decorate to your liking. I used 11 x 1 inches edges strip and a flower.

To close the top I punched 2 File tab punches, folded them and then punches little circle in them. I attached them to the front and back of my bag and tied them with ribbon; however this step is not neccesary and in case you want o simplify the project or if don't have tab punch on hand, you can punch circles on the upper part of the bag itself and run ribbon through them.