Crafty Secrets December Linky Party and Tutorial
Hello, Friends! Can you believe it is already December? Where did this year go? It’s time for the Crafty Secrets December Linky Party…the last one for 2014. Our theme this month is Cooking, Christmas or Calendars and the design team has prepared some wonderful projects to inspire your creativity. We hope you will play along with us and link your own project using Crafty Secrets products to the Linky Party BLOG. If you don’t have any Crafty Secrets products, you can find dozens of FREE PRINTABLES by clicking on the link. Just download and print so you can play along. Everyone who plays along wins a little prize, and one lucky participant is randomly chosen to win a $40 shopping spree in the Crafty Secrets store. No reason not to play along!
Hostess Gift Recipe Box Tutorial
The holiday season brings on lots of parties and occasions where you need a little hostess gift. I’ve used papers and images from the wonderful new Kitchen Memories Digital Kit to alter a kraft gift box. My family loves appetizers, and every Christmas Eve we have a fun party where I make all our favorite appetizers and that is all we have! So I filled my little box with a bunch of my favorite appetizer recipes. This would make such a sweet hostess gift at a holiday party. It’s cute, it’s useful and could be used all throughout the year.
I’ve had this little box in The Closet of Shame forever. It measures 5 1/4″ x 3 3/4″ so it’s the perfect size for standard 3″ x 5″ index cards.
I printed my papers and the recipe cards from the kit. I used the clipping tool in PaintShop Pro to trim around the decorated recipe card so that I could size it to fit my box dimension. Then, I copied and pasted 6 of them into Microsoft Word to use as recipe dividers sized to 5″ x 3″. The 7th one, I sized smaller so that I could add layers of paper to my box top. You know how I love my layers!
All the edgses of the box were inked liberally with Black Soot Distress Ink. I cut the vintage grocery paper to fit inside the lid and bottom of the box, inking them liberally with Vintage Photo Distress Ink.
Here’s a look at the cover “in progress.” I sewed around the edges of the Red Tweed paper and matted it on a slightly larger piece of black cardstock. I also stitched around my cute vintage recipe card, then matted it with red and black cardstock. I love the vintage vibe you get with this red, black, cream and white color palette! I free-hand cut the little fishtail banners and glued them in the top right corner of the box.
I love this project because it is so simple to make and comes together in just a couple of hours. It would probably take you even less time to make, as part of the time I spent was in searching for the images, and figuring out how to bring the concept together. I added some vintage metal corners, some cute buttons and a perky bow made with Micro Red Gingham. Quick and easy, but very, very cute!
Here are the recipe cards I printed and cut out. I used my trimmer to go around the straight edges, so there’s very little fussy cutting involved. I thought about computer journaling the text, but in the end, I decided to use my own handwriting. It just seemed to fit with this vintage project.
See how perfectly the cards fit into the box? This will be so much fun to gift to someone during the holidays!
I just had to show you this adorable cherry ribbon I found to line the sides of the box. I ran 1/4″ Scor-Tape around the perimeter and then pressed my ribbon down. It holds like a dream. I did the same thing on the bottom of the box, using the red micro gingham to tie in with the box cover. Quick and easy…because the holidays are busy!
Oh, the only other thing I did was print out the sentiment, cut it, ink the edges and treat with UTEE to age it. When the UTEE cools, you can bend the paper and create all those cool hairline cracks. I popped the sentiment circle up on foam dots to add a little dimension.
Here’s the links to the rest of the design team. We have TWO guest designers joining us this month. The fabulous Glenda Brooks from Magpie’s Corner joins us with her eye for vintage loveliness, and my very crafty friend Birgit Norton from Crafting While I Wait is sharing another of her fun, fresh designs with us. Lots of ideas and crafty inspiration await you as you visit the team:
Glenda ♥ Birgit ♥ Darlene ♥ Diane ♥ Elizabeth ♥ Gloria ♥ Melody ♥ Michele ♥ Shantaie ♥ Sheila
Once you’ve visited all the designer blogs and left them some love, head on over to the Crafty Secrets BLOG and link up your project to the Crafty Secrets December Linky Party. You need not follow the theme, but it’s always fun if you do! You have until midnight Pacific Time on Sunday, December 14th to add your project to the link and have a chance at winning that fabulous shopping spree!
Thanks for stopping by!
Cheerio,
kathy
Kathy, this is a great project. Love the colors and the details. What a great gift idea! Always enjoy coming here and seeing what you have been creating!
how super cute! I am always a sucker for stitching, and yours added so much dimension and detail to the cover of the box! you put me in the mood to bake!!!!
What a great keepsake to pass on family recipes and as usual Kathy you have included so many wonderful details like the way you lined the box and I love how you did the divider tabs! Our family usually goes to long time family friend’s house on Christmas Eve and it’s all appys and so much fun trying everything. This year we are hosting it and will do the same theme and get everyone to bring their favorite. Now that our 3 daughters are older they love cooking as much as me and it will be fun to see what everyone brings. My problem is I can never follow a recipe, I always change things around so it would be hard for me to make an recipe album like this unless I gave multiple spins on each dish, like 4 ways to make Asian Salad. I love all the photos you show and I posted the side one with the cool ribbon but you can’t really appreciate this until you see all the photos.
Great job, thanks for sharing
Sandy
YUMMY!!! Love this paper, and the recipe file idea is perfect! Love to see your writing too!
Wow Kathy, you have been a busy girl since my last visit! It took me a while to scan through all of your fabulous projects! You have made so many wonderful things, I especially love your Thanksgiving Mini Album! You are just so creative, I wish you lived closer so we could spend the day crafting together, oh how I would love to watch you work!
Hugs, until next time! Pamellia 🙂
Kathy, this project is just amazing. I love the little box, and all the cards for inside! What a great gift for a daughter or DIL for when it’s her turn to be in charge of the family traditions! My son was overjoyed with the little cookbook he found in my cabinet…it was one my MIL gave me for my wedding shower and was filled with her family’s favorite recipes. I added favorites from my childhood, and then added more over the years that I used for my husband in the early days of our marriage. I have not used it in a while, so it was fun to get it out and make things out of it with my son! We made chocolate whoopie pies from my mom’s recipe and then we used YOUR recipe to make the pumpkin whoopie pies. 😉
If this is the kind of hostess gift you bring I can hardly wait to have an opportunity to invite you round. This is so wonderful and the recipes look amazing which won’t surprise you as I tell you all the time what a big fan I am of your projects. I always forget to use UTEE and this has inspired me to give it a try. I noticed you have a cupboard of shame, and Darlene has a tub of shame. We have a room in which we keep Cosco’s oversized purchases that has slowly morphed into my crafting catchall. My husband is going to love this new phrase “room of shame”.
Love this little hostess box! I would love to receive something like this, especially if it came with the recipe’s already made. 😉 Your ideas always blow me away, Kathy.
what a great recipe box!! that is amazing and just love the colors!!!!
Absolutely gorgeous and clever!!!!!
I know I am one hostess that would love to receive a gift like this..how very clever and cute, I just might have to make one of these..love it, love and as always you have such an eye for all the fun details!! Wonderful project!!
As always I’m blown away by your project! So many wonderful bits and pieces to your design.
Such a WONDERFUL gift idea and of course you are so good with putting all the special touches on this altered item! LOVE IT! Thanks for always sharing such wonderful inspiration! I have a few ‘odd boxes’ in my ‘Tub of Shame’ (lol) that would probably work very well for this idea! LOVE the inside too … great job my friend! HAPPY DAY TO YOU!