Grandma had a button box, Stampin’ Up! has the Pretties Kit, and now Stamp Simply has a Bare Necessities Box! Talk about fun to make and put together!!! I created this project for a fun *Girlfriend Gift*, and following will be a complete tutorial so you can make one, too — if anyone so desires!!! This is one of those gifts that is as much fun for the giver as for the recipient!!! I had so much fun filling up my little boxes!!! Take a look:
Five small boxes within a sturdy, recycled box base, filled to the brim with fun things for your crafty girlfriend. A kit filled with any crafter’s Bare Necessities!!! And the fun Girlfriend card to give with this gift is a Joy Fold Card, another fun project!!! I’ll show you a few more pictures, then we’ll get down to the nitty gritty of how to make a Bare Necessities Box for yourself.
Here’s a peek inside!!! Ooh, I just smile looking at this!!! I’ll try to contain myself, but honestly, this was THE most fun project I think I have EVER done!!! I SO love all these type of things. Hope the recipient does, too!!! Lush ribbons, pretty buttons, vintage/recycled pieces of lace, satin flowers and all sorts of pretties — pearls, pins, crystals and charms!
Here’s the Joy Fold Card — so fun to do!!! A great tutorial on this Joy Fold Card, complete with all measurements, can be found at SCS in this tutorial written by Beate — thank you, Beate!!! This is a quick and fun fold that packs a lot of punch with very little effort!
In this shot I’m just trying to let you see how the card functions!
Here’s the card opened fully. This fun girlfriend sentiment, as well as the girlfriend greeting on the front, are in a set called Glamour Girls by Crafty Secrets. I got mine from Joan’s Garden. And now that you’ve seen the completed card, here’s how I did it:
The card base is 4.25″ x 8.5″, and using my Mini Scor-it, I scored at 3″, so when folded my card base is 4.25″ x 5.5″, a standard sized card. The smaller card that will be on top is cut 3″ x 8″ and scored at 4″. That’s it. Add your DP and assemble as shown in photos or, better yet, refer to Beate’s tutorial linked above. Can you see my scalloped top (Martha Stewart Scallop Punch) ? The DP is attached with double sided tape to a piece of SU cardstock — so it is quite thick, but I scored the embossed line above the scallops on my Mini Scor-It without any problems whatsoever — a beautiful embossed line — just a subtle detail, but it’s all the little details thatproduce agreat end result. Here’s a close-up:
Can you see the detail? I love it! I think adding a bit of embossing with the Scor-It or Mini Scor-It adds so much, with so little effort! If you’re not in the habit of scoring lines for embossed detail — give it a try — I think you’ll like it!!! And, oh YES, my pretty pin!! This post will be continued tomorrow, and tomorrow I will share information on sources for these beauties!!! And the *Necessities* monogram was done with JustRite products, discussed further down! Fun!!! OK, now on to the details for making the Bare Necessities Box.
We’re going to start by covering a recycled box base. The box I used was 7.25″ square. And I know many of you may actually HAVE this same box at home. It is the base only of the box containing the Harmony Circle Stamper III Ensemble. As you look at the pictures below, my box is pure white and your box will have the graphics of the JR product on it — but it’s the same box. When I got my Ensemble it was a prototype and just came in the plain box — that’s all! OK, now to cover our box:
Start by measuring how tall the sides are on your box. My box has sides a little over an inch tall. I wanted to cut my paper about 3 times the height of the sides, so I cut my paper so I had 3″widestrips. Then cut your strips as long as the sides of the box - in this case, 7.25″. Cut 4 strips and then score them right down the middle lengthwise, which for thisstrip was at 1.5″. I am using the Scor-It, and as you’ll see above, I am scoring with the paper upside down. I want the brown side to be the right side — so I want the valley side of the fold on the right side — and to do that I must score with the right side down/wrong side up.
Here’s my 4 scored strips. This is really aneasy way to cover the box and get good corners withoutmuch fuss at all. I cut 4 small pieces to cover the corners, as shown. I also took a brown marker and colored on the top rim in the corner area– I’m just a bit paranoid about any white showing through - LOL!!! To adhere the paper to the box, my choice is Mod Podge. I like it for covering projects as it sticks nice and tight and it never peels up once adhered. Its quick to work with, but can be a bit messy on your fingers. But in my opinion it’s worth it for the nice result it yields. OK, once your corners are all covered, take one of the scored strips, lay it on the rim, as shown, and press it to the inside with your fingers and to the underside, tightly creasing both creases as you press. Once you have formed it to the shape of the box with your fingers, take it off, you will probably have to clip out a bit at the lower inside corner where it goes along the box bottom, and then paint your Mod Podge over the inside of the strip, making sure to cover it all. Then quickly adhere that strip to the box, again pressing with your fingers — but it’ll go right into place easily as you had already formed it before you had any glue on it. Press to make sure all the air bubbles are out, then continue on to do the other 3 sides.
When you get the inside done, it’ll look like the box on the left above. Cut a piece to fit on the inside, which in this case was slightly less than a 7.25″ square, cover the back of the piece with your Mod Podge and adhere in the box, again pressing out all air bubbles. The 2nd photo shows the completed inside.
And here’s the outside after covering the sides, then after covering the bottom. In this case, I used a piece just about 7.25″ to cover the bottom.
And now that our box base is done, on to all the little boxes. The measurements provided below are to fit the above-referred to box. If you do this you may have a different sized box base you are using. In tomorrow’s post I will teach you how to determine what sizes you need to cut your paper and where you need to score, for whatever size boxes you need to make. Please check back tomorrow if that’s something you’d like help with.
All specific measurements for each of the 5 boxes will be listed at the end of this post. The process is the same for all of them. Once your box is cut and scored (see measurements below), cut your slits as shown above and apply adhesive of your choice to the corners. I have them marked with an X above. There is one major difference here from a normal box. Normally you would adhere your corner tabs on the INSIDE of the box — NOT SO with this box.I want the insides of these boxes to be the nicest sides as that is what we see, so we are going to adhere our tabs on the OUTSIDE of our box, as shown in the photo above.
And here’s a pic of all the boxes in the base. You can see they are not squeezed in there super tight as I still needed room to attach my labels and I also wanted them to be loose enough that I could easily removed any filled box without a struggle, and I can. I have also shown my labels partially done. They are made using the Damask Border Starter Kit Iby JustRite, but I used a different font rather than the font in the Kit. I chose the Special Occasions font for my labels, which can be purchased separately.I used markers to color my Initials and my borders - Real Red and Chocolate Chip — to go along with the the SU Bella Rose DP I’m using. Once stamped I cut, embossed and framed them using my Petite Circle Nestabilites by Spellbinders. But this photo does not show the finished label. If you’ll refer to the finished Bare Necessities Box, you’ll see that I also added a pink scallop framing behind the brown solid matting. The label as seen above was adhered to the inside of the box and I then adhered the pink scalloped framing to the outside of the box — just gives a more finished look. And can you see how/why I decorated my labels as I did? I wondered if anyone would ever get this — R for Ribbon, B for Button, L for Lace, F for Flowers and P for Pearls, Pins and Pretties!!! (Cute, huh? LOL!!!)
Here’s another front view of the completed Bare Necessities Box. My Necessities label on the box front was made with the same Special Occasions Font mentioned above and the Small Letter Set for Round Monogram Stamper. Rather than placing my letters in the round border formation you so often see, I just placed them in the center grid and got a straight word. I stamped my Necessities first, and then I stamped the N over it.And I’ll wrap it up here with the measurements for each individual box.
One thing that makes these boxes so easy, is that they are all scored exactly the same - 1″ from each edge. I put my guide/stopper at 1″ so scoring all these boxes was an effortless breeze. Once scored, cut slits on the score lines as show in this photo and photo up higher in this post, adhere tape to corners and tape. Remember, as I said above, for this project adhere you corner tabs on the OUTSIDE of the box. You’ll be done with this project before you know it!!!!
Ribbon Box - Cut paper5 x 7 - Score 1″ from all 4 edges
Button Box - Cut paper 4 1/8 x 5 - Score 1″ from all 4 edges
Lace Box - Cut paper 6 x 6 - Score 1″ from all 4 edges
Flower and Pretties Boxes - Cut paper 3 15/16 x 4 15/16 - Score 1″ from all 4 edges
These are just so quick and fun to make and could serve any number of purposes. I hope you get creative and come up with some more fun things to fill up a box you might make!!! If you’d like to read more about the Scor-It, they have a lot of good info on the Scor-It site. To purchaseeither the full sized Scor-It or the Scor-It Mini, you do need to go through a retailer. My friend Joan over at Joan’s Gardenjust got her order of Scor-It’s in, I know Ellen Hutson usually has them in stock (listed under Tools), and Marco’s Paper also carries the Scor-It Boards. These are all great places to deal with! And if you have any gifts to buy for crafters in your family or circle of friends, consider a Scor-It — I think you’d make someone VERY happy!!!
Thank you for bearing with me though this LONG post. It will be continued tomorrow with information on how to determine measurements for your own box, of any size, as well as informationon the pretty pins I’ve used. It’s super easy!!! Thanks for stopping in and I hope to see you all again tomorrow!!! Have a great day!!!
