I know that you love making cards, but are you giving them away? Sometimes we forget that we can not only send our cards to bless people, but we can also make a gift of them for people who don’t share our hobby. Most people still really appreciate handmade cards and love to give them away even if they don’t make them themselves. This beautiful card organizer will help you make a lovely gift for someone. It is quite special all on its own, but if you fill it with cards it is an amazing gift. All you need is an 8×10 inch paper bag from the dollar store. They come in all different colours, but I have used crumb cake and white. The other essential thing you need is the heavy duty cardstock that comes at the back of our patterned paper packs. Do not throw these out, they are useful for many things. Let’s get started.

It is amazing how you really don’t have to do much math to make this bag. Just follow the natural fold. The first big fold that is closest to the handles is exactly six inches, perfect for our 12×12 patterned paper. You cut off the bottom of the bag just above the fold so you don’t have all that thickness clogging up your paper trimmer. Then you cut each corner up to the six-inch fold line so that you can fold up the bottom of the bag to make a flat rectangular bottom.

Now, before you make the bag into a box you are going to decorate your sides. First put the heavy duty cardstock from the dsp on the bag and cover that with patterned paper. I found that for the sides it saved a lot of paper if you layered the 4″x6″ patterned paper on the 4 1/4″ x 6″ piece of coordinating cardstock. That way you just cut your 12×12 paper in half so that you have two 6″x12″ pieces. Cut the 6×12″ piece at 8″, then you will have a 4″ piece left over for each side. Bingo!

When your sides are fully decorated THEN it is time to fold up the bottom edges to make it into a flat bottom. Just adhere the bottom flaps in the logical manner.

After that you stand up, put the 4 3/8″ by 8″ piece of heavy cardstock on the table and adhere the 4×8″ piece of coordinating cardstock to it. Flip it over so that the coloured cardstock is on the bottom. Then put heavy duty adhesive such as Fast Fuse or tear and tape around all sides of this piece. Hovering over it so that you have a birds’ eye view, just set your bag onto the bottom piece and press down. If you want you could add a liner piece to the inside, but I have found that to be unnecessary.

The next step is to put the pleated accordion pieces inside on the narrow ends of the bag/box. Just put adhesive on both flat ends and press into the side of the box.

The next step is to make the dividers. This is super simple. Just take an 8″ by 11″ piece of white cardstock and score it in half. Set them inside the bag with the folded edge on the top. They stay in place really well because of the tension created from the accordion inserts. Add circle tops for labeling the dividers. I used 2″ circle punch and a 1 3/4″ circle punch.

I love how the colours combine here, night of navy with delightful dijon. Remember, delightful dijon is retiring so be sure you are stocked up on all you need. The floral boutique paper is also retiring but I just checked and it is sold out. They are making paper just like it in the new in-colours but you will have to wait until June 1 to get your hands on that!  To make the circle labels I used the Designer Tin of Tags stamp set. I don’t often use what I affectionately refer to as “contraband” but every once in a while I have to get my Graphic 45 fix, so I designed a Mother’s Day class using their paper. Here is a picture of that. I have to admit though that I like the Stampin’Up! bag every bit as much if not more for the  clean and simple lines. What do you think?

I finally decided to do a short video just to show how to put the bottom of the bag/box on and how to add the accordion fold pieces in the inside to hold the section dividers.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9RvBJMN634