Bastelesel

Today you’ll see my little box filled with chocolate – a nice alternative for missing cookies when getting unexpected visitors for a cup of tea or coffee. Just prepare some bows and boxes in advance to assemble and use them lateron. For the box you need 15×15 cm cardstock which needs to be scored at 4/4.5/10.5 and 11cm. Then make a quarterturn to the left and score at 8.5 and 9cm. Cout out the small outer areas – see PDF-format, lower part. Then outline the edges of the bigger areas as you like. Turn up the center part and close the side parts on top of it with a drop of glue. In the end attach your prepared bow and fill.

One of the bigger bows just decorates a simple paper bag. It’s the color combination of bag bow and ribbon that makes the difference. With a nice badge you’ll have a gift to say thank you, for a birthday or a voucher.

Paper bows simply embellish every wrapping. They can be made with quite expensive punches but I prefer the economical method of cutting them myself with a template. It’s easily done with paper but they’re looking quite nice with card stock too. Then you should stretch the upper part over a scissor blade.

Transfer the selected bow parts to your pape and cut them out. If you need a bigger bow just scale up the template with a copier.

For the upper bow just revert both sides to the back and glue the outer nose-pieces to the middle. Then glue your bow to the white base. (Unfortunately the picture’s a bit cloudy but the bow was already glued when I noticed it.)

Now twist the black stripe round the middle of your bow and glue it to the back.
My bow’s decorating a little box resembling a shirt that’s filled with a bank note. Attached to a small bottle of sparkling wine or some chocolate it’s a lovely birthday gift.
Further suggestions for thee use of such bows and a template for my box will follow.