It's a Wrap - March - Crate Paper

Hello Crate fans! It's Tara here today to share the second installment of It's a Wrap ~ where we wrap up the end of each month by playing with a different gift-wrap theme! In deciding the particular theme of this month, I decided to go the route of House Warming. It was an easy choice too because not only have we recently moved but we also welcomed new next door neighbors earlier this month!

Moving has taught me many things; to make peace with the fortress of cardboard boxes that resided in the living room for a short time, that sometimes you need to rearrange your furniture 3 and 4 times to make everything fit just so and you will most likely be visiting a home-improvement store multiple times a day for the first few weeks after a move. With those things in mind, I've concluded the best house-warming gift were those wonderful gift cards to Home Depot! (Ok, so maybe that gift card to a local restaurant was a very close runner-up, after all sometimes it's just nice to let someone else make dinner and do the dishes for you!)

Today's focus will be about wrapping a gift card as a house-warming gift!

A simple idea for wrapping up a gift card, is finding a small scale box. I love to wander down the baking isle of craft stores to find a variety of dainty confection boxes! I find them to be the perfect size for small gifts and gift cards! With this particular gift wrap theme, I wanted to include items that were relevant to the house theme. Local driving maps of the area (although I didn't have any on hand, I did happen to find driving maps for Brazil!) were used to wrap up my petite box.

A tag from the Story Teller collection was used to write a short message and I even included a couple of old keys (thanks to my Grandfathers collection) as an accent to tie the whole home theme together!

When wrapping your gift look for items that would match well with your overall theme. I think including a few paintbrushes, maybe a small potted plant or even a candle can be a sweet add-on in addition to the gift. With just a few extra steps, you can turn an ordinary gift card into a pretty wrapped House Warming gift!

I also wanted to share an idea I had for sending out change of address cards! Remember when I mentioned that fortress of cardboard boxes I had accumulated? Well, I was able to put a couple of them to good use!

After breaking down a few boxes, I carefully cut the cardboard to the size of a postcard. With a little help from a die-cut machine and Story Teller alphabet stickers, I created these We've Moved postcards to hand out to our friends and family!

After cutting each piece of cardboard down to size, I used a bit of sandpaper to lightly distress the edges and to help peel and remove a little of the paper. I love the worn look that sandpaper can create!

It's a fun take on the traditional card, plus I really like being able to reuse those boxes! I hope you enjoyed this month's It's a Wrap post! I'll be back next month with a whole new theme and a few more ideas for you! Have a wonderful and hopefully creative weekend!

Happy Housewarming! ~ Tara