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Monday, November 14, 2016

Making paper envelopes for packaging gifts

a homemade seed packet for gifting my garden-grown seeds

This is what I have used to package both the bath tea, and some seeds that I collected from my garden this summer.

(Forgot to mention this the other day, but before sliding a tea sachet into one of these decorative envelopes, I put each one in a snack-sized ziploc, to hold in the fragrance. I did the same, as well, for the seeds, to keep out moisture until planting season.)

If working with paper and sewing happen to be your thing, these are easy to make and enhance some of your hand-crafted gifts. I enjoy the process of using images on sites like Graphic's Fairy to craft something new and unique. And they're very inexpensive to make, just the cost of the printed out sheet of paper and a little thread.

Yes, you can sew on paper. I've had to experiment on a piece of scratch paper to find the right stitch length, tension and needle, to avoid skipping stitches. But once I got that down, the sewing went quickly, and surprisingly well.

For my envelopes:


The ones with the script, I typed up a poem that I enjoy, in a scripted font, and printed out onto paper. On these, I then tea-stained those sheets.

I found the center portion of the script that I wanted for my envelope, and marked the paper with cutting lines.


I cut along those lines, then cut that center portion in half, width-wise, leaving me with 2 pieces of equal size.

Next, I cut off a 1 inch-strip off the top of one half. Placing the 2 halves together, right sides facing out, both front and back, I lined up the bottom edges of both halves. This leaves me with one side of the envelope longer than the other (for the folded flap).


I snipped the upper corners at an angle on the back (longer) piece of paper.

I used a zig zag stitch of medium length and width, and sewed the front to the back, around 3 sides. And last, I folded the back, upper edge over, to close the envelope.


For the seed packets, I used Graphic's Fairy for the free images, and added my own text with content information. I chose a taller print for the main side of the envelope, and a shorter image for the back side. I was able to fit the pieces for 2 envelopes onto 1 sheet of paper.


After printing out my sheets of images, I marked my cutting lines, giving myself plenty of margin for the stitching on three sides, and added a 1-inch space above the carrot image, for a blank flap to fold over the upper part of the jardin side of the envelope.


I stitched these up along 3 edges, using a zig zag stitch in dark green thread.


Turn the flap down, and there's my envelope.

These could be cute for a variety of gifting purposes, such as gift cards, cash gifts, home grown tea bags, garden-grown seeds, bath salts and tea, and home-made spice mixes.

15 comments:

  1. Lovely! Thanks for the tutorial! I'm going to be gifting some homemade taco and fajita seasoning this year. I wasn't sure how I was going to package those until now. I'll use the snack size ziploc bags and make these envelopes. I'm not extremely crafty, but your tutorial makes it look doable! I'm going to look for some hot pepper graphics How exciting!

    Have a great day!
    Angie

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Angie,
      Your taco and fajita seasoning sounds like an awesome gift! If you get a chance, can you post your instructions/recipe? And hot pepper graphics sound perfect for what you're making.

      Have a great day, Angie!

      Delete
    2. Sure! I'll dig out the recipes and post them tomorrow. :)

      Angie

      Delete
  2. Such good ideas! Not sure I'll make any but it's good to have the idea "at the ready" in case I might just need a little envelope for something.
    Alice

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Alice,
      That's right. Sometimes just having the thought of something can spur you on to something else, or come in handy, some day down the road.

      Have a wonderful day, Alice!

      Delete
  3. Hi Lili,
    Thank you for the tutorial.Super cute!
    Blessings,
    Patti

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Patti,
      You're welcome! (And, thanks!)

      Hope your day is off to a lovely start!

      Delete
  4. Such a very nice way to present a small gift, Lili. Thank you for the ideas and instructions.
    Mary

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Mary. I like the way they turned out.
      Have a wonderful day! Hope you have some sunshine today.

      Delete
  5. Thank you for your lovely gift pressentation ideas!! I remember your envelope origami from the past year too :) Unfortunately, I go blank when I have to think of how to present a gift. Maybe there is some psychological meaning to it, but I'm one who presents everything in plain market bags. Hmmmm....

    Have a wonderful day!!

    YHF

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, YHF!
      you know, I think some people "see" the item, itself, and some people "see" the packaging. I do think I am easily swayed by pretty packaging. Some companies really have that down, like Crabtree and Evelyn -- they have some of the prettiest packaging, so pretty I keep the package, hoping to use it somehow in the future.

      My son gave me some hand cream from their store on my last birthday. I enjoyed the box it came in as much as the product!

      I hope you're having a wonderful day, as well, YHF!

      Delete
  6. Maybe you should consider creating pretty packaging extra income .... of course, sometimes it's just nice to do things because you love to do it! :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I meant to say "for extra income"--oops! Anyway, your packaging is lovely enough to use in a retail setting.

      Delete
    2. Thank you, Kris. Hmmm, you're giving me ideas.
      You're right, though, sometimes it is just nice to do things because you love it.

      Have a lovely day, Kris!

      Delete

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