DIY Gift Bags

DIY Gift Bags

I have been thinking of a way to make the gift bags for my daughter's birthday special and I decided that making my own and personalizing them was a perfect way to do it! You can vary the dimensions, of course, but here's what I used to create a bag that is 5'' tall, 4.5'' wide, and 3'' deep.

Supplies

1. Construction paper

2. Ruler

3. Scissors

4. Glue stick

5. Pen or pencil

6. Hole punch (optional)

Steps

1. First take two standard pieces of construction paper and measure out the lengths for the bag. I had to use two pieces of paper and I cut them to the length that I needed to fit the bag. I measured across the first one 1'' - 3'' - and then 4.5''. You will have a little extra left over on that paper but leave it because you will attach the second paper to it. On the second paper I measured across 3'' - 4.5'' and then I cut off the remaining paper that was extra to the right of the 4.5'' section. Next I glued the 3'' section on top of the extra section on the first paper. It should look like one big section of paper like below.

2. Next I measured from the bottom 2'' for the bottom of the bag and 1 in on the top for the top of the bag.

3. Fold along all of the lines and then fold them back out.

4. Put glue on the outside of the 1'' tab and bring the left-most section over to form the body of the bag, aligning the cut edge of the section with the folded edge of the flap.

5. Next you are going to fold the 2'' side to make the bottom of the bag. Fold the short sides inward as if you were wrapping a present. I lay the bag on its side and crease the folds against the table to make nice straight folds.

6. Put glue on both flaps and fold them inward to form the bottom of the bag. Stand the bag upright and press down to help the glue hold. You can cut a piece of construction paper to fit the bottom of the bag and put it inside of the bottom of the bag to help hold and cover up the folds if you want.

7. Stand the bag upright and fold in the 1'' section to make the top of the bag. You can put glue along the inside of the fold to help hold it down. Start folding from one corner and work your way around.

8. You can punch holds in the rim of the bag and string some cord or ribbon through the holds to form handles. You can also add any design to the outside that you like to match your theme.

DIY Food Decorations and Labeling

Since I will be having a pink and green tea party I am trying to use them as much as I can. We will be keeping the guest list small with only a few other little girls and family. I wanted a cute way to decorate and label the food and this is what I came up with:


DIY Food Labels 

Supplies:
1. Paper
2. Stencils or letter stickers
3. Scissors
4. Ruler


Steps:
1. I counted how many letters I will need to label the food so that I knew how long to make the label.
2. I measured the paper and cut it to size.
3. The scrapbook that I found to use for the decorations came with letter stickers and that is what I used for the letters. If you don't have them you could just write it out with a pen or marker but the stickers made it a lot easier.
4. I next found the middle of the paper and if the food had an odd number of letters then I put the middle letter in the middle of the paper and worked my way out putting the stickers next to each other to make sure the word is centered.


On the day of the paper I will just take the labels and use some double sided tape to attach them to the serving bowls or plates. Here are some of the other ones that I made.

DIY Cup Cake Decorations

I decided I wanted to do cup cakes for her birthday instead of the a large cake because that are easier to make and people eat them more.

Supplies:

1. Paper

2. Stencil for shape of decoration

3. Scissors

4. Tape

5. Toothpick

6. Glue

7. Letter stencil or pen/marker for letters

Steps:

1. First I picked out the paper that I wanted to use for the Cup Cake Decorations and then I picked out the shape I wanted to make it out of. The scrapbook that I bought to make the decorations out of had this stencil and I thought that it would be cute. You can really use any shape that you want.

2. I then traced the stencil onto the paper and then cut them out.

3. I then popped out the letters from the stencils to use on the flowers I cut out and glued them to it.

                                                     

4. Next I taped the toothpick onto the back of the flowers.

I spelled out the words Happy Birthday and then a few with just some celebrations words. I will put the cup cakes on a stand and then I will put these decorations on top to finish the look :)

Here are what some of them looked like!

DIY Paper Banner

I found this birthday banner online while I was looking for idea's for my daughter's birthday party and I thought that it was something that I could make myself without spending an arm and a leg for it online.

What I used to make the banner:

1. Paper

2. Scissors

3. Ruler

4. String

5. Marker

6. Hole punch

Steps: 

1. First I cut the paper into a square, depending on how big you want the triangles determines how big to make the squares. I did mine 12in X 12in.

2. I then folded the squares in half to make a triangle.

3. Next I punched two holes in the top of the triangle along the straight edge, an even distance away from the ends.

4. I then traced the letter onto the triangle. I am doing a tea party theme for her birthday so I spelled out the words tea party onto the triangles.

5. Once I got all of my triangles cut out with the letters on them is took my string and strung it through the holes.

This banner is super easy to make and can be used for so many different parties. I will be using this one for Madalynn's Birthday Tea Party but you can put almost anything on it like: Happy Birthday, Surprise...etc.

DIY Paper Flowers

After I decided and ordered Madalynn's Birthday Invitations I started working on decorations. I love to make my own decorations because:
1. It saves lots of money
2. I love the satisfactions when it is all done
3. It gives me something fun to do while the girls take a nap besides cleaning :P

The first thing I decided to do was create some paper flowers out of green, pink and white tissue paper.
This is suck an easy decorations to make and it will give the party a great atmosphere!

I bought some regular tissue paper at Hobby Lobby for $0.99 in the colors that I wanted. One package of tissue paper makes two paper flowers or one big paper flower so depending on how many you want will determine how many packages to buy.
I plan to decorate the front of the house with the paper flowers as well as the backyard around the party so I got about 10 different packages.

Things you will need:
1. Tissue paper in the color of your choice
2. Scissors
3. String to tie and hang the flowers from

Steps
1. First you take the tissue paper and cut it in half so that they are not as wide.
2. You want at least 8 - 10 sheets of tissue paper for each paper flower.
3. Then you take one stack of the tissue paper and start to fold them accordion style in about 1in pieces.
4. You then take a some string and tie it in the middle to hold all of the paper together.
5. Then cut the ends of the tissue paper into the shape that you want your pedals. I normal just round them off because I find that it comes out the best in the end.
6. Then you take one end of the paper flower and start to spread out the individual pieces of tissue paper. Make sure to pull them all the way apart to get then best results.
7. Then you repeat on the other side.

I found this video on Youtube that might also be some help in making the flowers:

Here is what some of mine looked like after I was done!

All together I made 25 paper flowers to hang out in the front of the house and in the trees and it only cost me about $5.00 to make all of them!