Friday, February 11, 2011

Easy Valentine Gift Bag and Flower Tutorial

 I did this tutorial for the February Scrapdango Newsletter and thought I'd share here too!  Let me know if anything doesn't make sense and if you make one I'd love to see it...link it up!  I'm linking to 30 Days' Pity Party for the first time today!


Supplies:
*Paper lunch bag
*Patterned paper (1 or 2)
*12" ribbon
*Pages from a book
*Scalloped circle punch (mine is about 2")
*Velcro
*Mist

1. Cut the top off your bag so that it is 6" tall. Mine is 5" wide...check yours and adjust the measurements I give here!

2. Cut the pp you want for the front of your bag to 5" (width) x 6".
Cut your other pp to 5" (width) x 8.5". This will be the back and front flap of the bag.

3. Now you are going to fold the bottom flap of the lunch bag down. Like this:



4. Glue the front onto your bag...this goes on the side without the flap. You want to line up the bottom edge with the bottom edge of the bag...you can always trim at the top if you need to.


5. Grab your piece of pp that is the back and score (or fold) it at 6". Then punch 2 little holes on that score line.


6. Feed your ribbon through these holes, tying knots on the inside to keep them in place.

7. If you have a border punch, now is the time to punch the top flap.



8. Glue the back on. Line up the scored flap with the top of the bag. There WILL be a lip at the bottom...you want that! It will make your bag stand straight when we're done. You can tuck the ribbon under the pp if you want.


9. Add a piece of velcro on the flap to hold it down. Your bag is finished unless you want to add some decorations!


Let's make a flower to embellish the bag!
1. Punch out 6 scalloped circles...non-scalloped work too. So do hand-cut circles that aren't perfect! My circles are about 2" across.



2. Spray all of the circles with the mist...you want them pretty covered and wet! I have found that Glimmer Mist works better than the Smooch for this. The Smooch dries a little to fast but it will work. If it dries too fast, you can just mist with some water! The Smooch does give a richer color too! I used Smooch here. (from the Spice kit!)


3. Now, stack them all up (yes, they're wet and yes, you're going to get messy!) and attach with a brad. I usually just poke it through without punching a hole.


4. Scrunch up each circle, one by one, like this:


Until it looks like this:


5. Now just sort of fluff out the circles until you are happy with how it looks.


6. Cut some leaves (I used a coffee sleeve) and mist if desired.


7. Attach your leaves and flower to the bag flap! And there you have a wonderful treat bag...perfect for Valentine's Day treats!