Decorated egg boxes

Hello sweets! I have been very busy over the past few days trying to get myself ready for Easter. Gluing and spraying bunnies for this years bunny jars, melting pounds of chocolate into lollipops, eggs and carrots etc. Painting and decorating egg cups and dressing my bunnies!
So I am just dropping in to share with you my decorated Easter egg boxes that I shall fill with mini chocolate nests, chocolate eggs and mini cupcakes.

Egg boxes £3.87 for 20 from Chickengear
Washi tape from Superlovely
Neon ribbon from Paperchase
Easter Labels free to download from Friday's post




Have a sweet day!

Beautifully Wrapped

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you some beautiful packages in lovely neutrals from some of the most creative people on Flickr. I can't wait to start wrapping my gifts!

Some beautiful shots from my Flickr favourites (clockwise from top left):

• The flower in Compai's {earth friendly} gift wrapping ideas by Justine Blakeney
• The chunky wood tag in LEH Project by Iro {Ivy style33}
  
• The pretty stickers in Gift wrapping... by Iro {Ivy style33}
• The ever so pretty garland in Paper Lace Gift Wrap Set by 3GIRLS+ a goat

Have a sweet day!

Pretty Package

This week on Flickr Faves Sunday, I bring you some gorgeous pretty packages in sugary colours from some of the most creative people on Flickr. I can't wait to start wrapping my gifts! I just have to buy and make them first!

Some beautiful shots from my Flickr favourites (clockwise from top left):

• The gorgeous leaves in pink glassine lined bags by Creature Comforts
• The wonderful wooden spool + pink bakers twine = ♥ by
  Ishtar olivera ♥
• The delightful purple and pink washi tape ♥ by Ishtar olivera ♥
• The ever so pretty Wrapped Gifts by Such Pretty Things

Have a sweet day!

My Gift Wrapping

This year I wrapped my Christmas presents in a combination of brown craft paper and snowflake printed foil wrap. I decorated my packages with MT masking tape, tied them up with spotty ribbon, rik-rak and yarn. The To's and From's were written on a mix of mini luggage tags and hand made doe tags. A post with free downloadable graphic is coming soon, ready for next year!

The little house boxes from Target were filled with coloured tissue-wrapped stocking fillers to introduce colour at the windows. I bought an extra set of the house boxes that I want to pop LED tea lights into next year and make a feature of them.

Have a sweet day!

Deer printed bags of honeycomb

Deer printed bags

You will need:
White sweet bags
P1 address labels
Baby deer rubber stamp
Snowflake rubber stamps
Color Box copper pigment stamp pad

Equipment:
Shape-mates circles
Shape-mates carriage
Glass cutting mat

Instructions

1. Rubber stamp deer and snowflakes on paper bag, leave to dry.
2. Click the label picture below to open in separate window, ready to print.
3. Print labels onto P1 address labels.
4. Place label sheet on glass cutting mat.
5. Cut out using the small shape-mates template and carriage (video instructions here).
6. Fill bag with hand-made honeycomb (click for recipe).
7. Fold over top of bag.
8. Peel off back of label and carefully stick to secure top of bag down.

Have a sweet day!

Winter Woodland treat boxes

Winter Woodland treat boxes

You will need:
Winter Woodland treat box printed out on heavy paper
Double sided tape
Polka dot glassine bags
Ribbon

Equipment
Tim Holtz non-stick micro-serrated multicutter
Mini rotary perforator
Paper punch - medium '1cm ribbon'

Instructions

1. Open cone print template (see image below) and print it out.
2. Cut around cone wrapper, (I use the shape mates large circle and cutter to cut out my circles).
3. Roll perforator along all lines.
4. Fold all perforated lines away from you.
5. Place a couple of strips of double sided tape on the unprinted side of the bottom of the box, but do not peel backing off tape yet.
6. Place a strip of double sided tape on the unprinted side of the long sides of the box, do not peel backing of tape yet.
7. Place a strip of double sided tape along all four white strips of printed side of box and remove backing.
8. Assemble box and press together to stick.
9. Fold over top of cellophane bag by 10cm.
10. Place fold inside paper ribbon punch and push to end. Punch ribbon holes.
11. Remove backing from double sided strips on inside of box.
12. Open glassine bag out and place inside box, pressing against the tape to fix in place.
13. Fill with treats.
14. Thread ribbon through holes and tie in a bow.

I filled mine with Maple cakelets in pine cone, walnut and acorn shapes, with a hidden iced squirrel!

Have a sweet day!

Winter Woodland candy cones

Winter woodland candy cones

You will need:
Cone wrapper
Double sided tape
Polka dot cellophane
Ribbon

Equipment
Tim Holtz Non Stick Micro-Serrated Multicutter

Shape~Mates Circles
Shape~Mates Carriage

Instructions

1. Open cone print template (see image below) and print it out.
2. Cut around cone wrapper and along lines to give 3 wrappers. (I use the shape mates large circle and cutter to cut out my circles.
3. Roll one of the wrappers into a cone shape and, using double sided tape, fix in place.
4. Place a second piece of tape inside the cone along one side and peel off backing.
5. Cut out cellophane (use the "cellophane pattern" below as a stencil to cut out your cellophane - note each straight line is 24cm long).
6. Roll cellophane into a cone shape and place inside cone wrapper. Press against the tape to fix in place.
7. Fill with candy.
8. Tie ribbon around the top.

Last year I made candy cones for Halloween & Christmas. This year I custom designed some for a friend of mine to give out as wedding favours. Four of us spent several hours putting together over 100 of them to be filled with sugared almonds. So, this Christmas I have designed them around my winter woodland theme and filled them with hand-made nut shaped chocolates with creamy maple centres.




Have a sweet day!

Mint packaging

This week on Wonderful World of Etsy I am featuring pretty mint packaging supplies.

1. Spring blue cotton decor tape 3 Set (dot, stripe, flower)
2. Turquoise gable boxes
3. Mint vintage-style butterflies
4. Shabby Paris gift tags

Have a sweet day!

Kitchen herb jar labels

I am in the process of organizing my new kitchen. As the highlight colours in my new kitchen are duck egg blue and a splash of pink, I have made labels for all my jars using those colours: duck egg blue for savoury and pink for sweet.

First, I organized my herbs and spices. I already had quite a few Spezia spice jars from Habitat that my sweet sister had given me one Christmas as a filled set. So, it made sense to keep these and add to my collection. I wrote a list of all the spices and herbs I had and bought new jars for those not in Spezia jars already. For the labels, I designed a few of my ideas and printed them out on regular paper first to get an idea of what they would look like. In the end I went with the above design. I wanted the labels to last so covered them in sticky back plastic. Here's how I did it:

Kitchen herb jar labels

You will need:
P1 address labels
Book covering roll
Shape-mates circles
Shape-mates carriage
Glass cutting mat

1. Click below labels to open in separate window, ready to print
2. Print labels onto P1 address labels
3. Carefully cover labels using the book covering roll.
4. Place plastic covered label sheet on glass cutting mat
5. Cut out using the small shape-mates template and carriage (video instructions here)
6. Peel off back of label and carefully stick to jar

A big thank you to Simon at Tonic studios, who sent me a box full of craft tools he thought I might like after seeing my post, Butterfly packaging, where I had used the Tonic Studios border punch system I had bought from a craft fair to create pretty butterfly lace paper bags.

Have a sweet day!

Butterfly packaging

Packaging

You will need:
White sweet bags
Tonic Studio Butterflies Accent Punch
Tonic Studio Edger Punch 3
Tonic Studio Border Punch System
Cavallini butterflies rubber stamp tin
VersaColor Small Stamp Pad - Pink
VersaColor Small Stamp Pad - Seafoam

1. Place the paper bag centrally onto the border system
2. Move the left and right markers to 3.5cm
3. Place butterfly punch into system
4. Make the first punch and then move the bag left so that the edge of the outer butterfly matches the centre line of the marker, and repeat all the way to the edge
5. Repeat the last step in the opposite direction
6. Place edger punch 3 into the system and do as steps 4 and 5
7. Stamp butterfly pattern onto bag and leave to dry

For the gift tags I used a pop up butterfly punch.

Have a sweet day!

Hand printed bags of handmade honeycomb

I made some honeycomb a while ago and it went down a treat with my friends, so I thought it would make a great little treat for Christmas. Originally, I was going to put it in some star-and-stripe printed candy cones like the ones I did for Halloween but I ended up running out of time! Instead, I came up with a quick way of making some pretty Christmas candy packaging for my honeycomb.

I had ordered some white paper candy bags for Halloween but ended up using the striped ones instead. So, after trying out my snowflake stamps in pink, green, pale blue and red (my holiday colour scheme) on my paper bags, I came to the conclusion that only red would look the best. I quickly got to randomly stamping 4 different styles of snowflakes all over the front of the bags then filled them with the honeycomb and used some of my striped masking tape to seal the backs of the bags. Ready to go!

I popped into Paperchase to pick up some stamps and reindeer candles and saw some boxes of mini clothing pegs with little red felt deer on the front. I thought they would be a cute addition to the bags of candy, with the added bonus that they could also be used to attach the Christmas cards to the back of the bags!

Honeycomb (makes about 10 bags)

Ingredients
600g caster sugar
2 tbsp liquid glucose
100ml water
100ml liquid honey
1 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
500g dark chocolate

Cooking instructions

1. Place the sugar, honey, water and liquid glucose in a heavy based jug. Using a candy thermometer, heat until the temperature reaches 160deg C
2. Remove from heat quickly
3. Add the bicarbonate of soda and whisk immediately
4. Pour onto a greased baking sheet and leave to cool down
5. Break into small chunks
6. Temper dark chocolate (click for details)
7. Pour chocolate over the chunks of honeycomb
8. Place on a sheet of baking paper and leave in fridge to set

Packaging
White sweet bags
Snowflake stamps
Colorbox ink pad - cranberry
Reindeer clips
Striped masking tape

Have a sweet day!