My life is so busy and happy these days that I can hardly stand it! We are expecting our first grandchild this summer and the months leading up to this happy event are so much fun. We had a baby shower for my daughter-in-law last weekend and, of course, I made table favors.
As the shower had a springtime theme, I wanted to create a nest of eggs and the Wood Crate Framelits were perfect. I made the crates from Powder Pink cardstock. Before I die-cut them, I stamped each 1/4 sheet of cardstock with the Hardwood background stamp using Powder Pink.
Did you know?
The easiest way to use a background stamp is to lay it stamp side up and tap your inkpad over the surface. This makes it easy to see when you have ink completely covering the stamp. Lay your cardstock down and gently but firmly rub your hand over the entire surface. It helps keep your hands clean if you lay a scrap piece of paper over the cardstock while you rub. Lift the cardstock straight up.
About the embellishments...
The sweet little chick was drawn by a talented family member. I know, everyone should be so lucky to have that kind of talent in the family, right? I printed them on Whisper White cardstock and die-cut them with my Stitched Shapes Framelits. The scalloped circle is cut from Crumb Cake cardstock. The "sweet baby" banner was made from a retired Stampin' Up set called Itty Bitty Banners.
What's inside...
The crate is filled halfway with paper shreds. These can be found in a rainbow of colors anywhere you buy supplies for filling gift baskets. The candy is Hershey's candy coated milk chocolate eggs. These are easy to find around Easter, and Amazon has them all year long. I cut a 9" square of nylon netting, placed 10 eggs in the center and tied them with a variety of ribbons from my craft stash. These crates are a generous size - they will hold a lot more candy, but I was rationing my eggs - I had 50 of these to fill!
Each crate requires 2 die-cuts. You'll want to be sure as you cut each one that the long thin strip on each side of the crate is removed from the die before you cut the next piece - here's what I mean:
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Tips for cutting & assembling the crates...
Simply flip the die over and use a paper piercing tool to poke into a couple of the holes to loosen one end of the strip.
Then you can grab one end of the strip and easily pull the extra piece out. This piece is discarded.
If you forget to do this, the cardstock can build up in these thin grooves and you will be left wondering why your die is not cutting anymore. You can probably guess how I know this. Yup, it was a head scratcher until I figured out what was going on!
Begin by folding on all the scorelines. The die makes the scorelines as it cuts, how great is that?! To assemble the crates, place a strip of double-sided adhesive tape along the two tabs on the end of the crate. Because I was making 50 of these (that's 100 die-cuts, each crate requires 2), I used one piece of tape instead of cutting 2 pieces. Any little shortcut helps, right?
You will need to cut a "v" shaped notch in the tape between the 2 tabs so that they can fold independent of each other.
Begin assembling the crate by using 2 strips of double-sided tape on the bottom (inside) of one of the pieces, as shown here
Match the 2 bottoms and attach together.
Fold one end of the crate in and adhere the bottom tab using the tape you previously added. Be sure to match up the corners as you assemble.
Adhere the second tab. Repeat on the other end of the crate.
There you have it - ready to fill!
These little crates are so sweet. Everyone at the shower loved these favors! I can picture these decorating my Thanksgiving table in fall colors and filled with foil-wrapped chocolates. Here's a project I made for Valentine's Day...filled with one dozen foil-wrapped chocolate hearts.
Itty Bitty Banners Clear-Mount Bundle
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Thanks for visiting today!
Pat
A very clear tutorial. I like the pictures better than videos because I can study them without rewinding and trying to pause at just the right place. Nice job!
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