Altered Candy Boxes -- A DIY Tutorial

Many moons ago, I made Rick a little candy box for Valentine's Day. It was pretty cute, but I'm better now! In sore need of a crafternoon, I made up a model to share for a relatively quick project. Here's the finished piece. Let's get started!

Supplies include papers of your choice (origami and scrapbook papers are pretty!), glue stick, glue gun or other favorite glue, scissors, ribbons or lace or both, embellishments that could include cut outs, buttons, flowers, and a heart-shaped candy box. A Xyron X-box is useful but not required.

(I bought loads of candy boxes after Valentine's Day one year for about 25 or 50 cents each but I saw the small ones at Target the other day for a dollar. Size is up to you. To be honest, I think the candy in them is pretty so-so and I'd recommend filling them with M&Ms or some homemade treat!)

First, remove the candy or insides from the box. You can save the tray if you plan to refill it (I used M&Ms so discarded it). The paper heart can serve as a template for your inside liner.

Draw around the top and bottom of the box on your paper (I know I don't have to tell you to turn it upside down but I will on the off chance your third grader is reading this.)

Cut it out -- you don't need to be exact here. Better to make it a little large than cut too closely to the line. Glue it on with your glue stick (a dryer glue like a glue stick is better here) and then trim.

Also trace around the paper heart from inside the box and cut out the heart that will be your box liner. Glue this to the bottom of the box.



Then put your box back together. It will either have a top that closes to the bottom like this or one where the top meets the bottom half way. This determines the ribbon you will want to use on the side of your box. I was able to use a wider ribbon but you may need two pieces of one that is thinner.

I love my Xyron X-Box for ribbon. You just put it through and it comes out sticky. But if you don't have one, I would use either a very strong doublestick tape (like the red tape) or a fabric glue.

Attach the ribbon to the box. You want the ribbon to be flush to the box (that little end sticking up was glued down when I "came around.") Be extra careful when coming to the indentation around the top. Use something like a butter knife or scissor blades to be sure the ribbon attached all the way into the groove.

If you are using lace on the edges of the box, that's next. Using your glue gun, work slowly around the top and/or bottom edges of the box attaching your lace a bit at a time. Be careful around corners -- you may need to cut in and do the corners by pieces, which is easy, just annoying because it would be easier to do it in one piece.

When it's done it will look like this and that's boring! Time for the fun part.

Play around with what you want on the top. (You probably did a bit of this when you were choosing your papers initially.) Consider buttons, cut outs, even fun three-dimensional objects. I did this one kind of foo-foo but you could go streamlined with game pieces, scrabble tiles, Cracker Jack prizes, doll house bits or other things that fit your Valentine.

If you are working with a paper cut out, you might want to mount it on card stock or watercolor paper with your glue stick to ensure that it is sturdy.

 
Place them around your box to "audition" them. When you are satisfied start putting them down with your glue gun or the firm adhesive of your choice. E-6000 is good too.

I did mine in about an hour. The longest part was picking what to use. The second longest part was getting the lace around the edge of the box. Making selections is mandatory. Lace is optional! Voila!

That concludes the tutorial portion of this post! Below are images you can save and print for your own projects. Click on the photos to enlarge and right click to save on your computer.

 

Sharing this week with: Let's Keep in Touch at Let's Add Sprinkles / Share Your Style /  Pink Saturday /  Share Your Cup