Gift card explosion

Good Morning and Happy Monday!

It is still quite cold here in the Badger state! At 8:00 am it was at -8, with a wind chill of -16!
I am looking forward to 3 more snow storms this week...can you hear my sarcasm?LOL!

How is everyone doing on their Christmas projects? Shopping? Baking?
I got some shopping done this weekend but am not finished. I gave up on my Christmas projects and baking, who does that? Hehehe!

Since I gave up on my Christmas projects, I was able to make one of the projects floating around in my head.
I always feel guilty just giving a gift card inside a card because it's not an actual wrapped present. Everyone likes opening a wrapped present, right?
Instead of putting the card in a box and wrapping it up, I created a gift card box.

Have you ever heard of or seen a mini photo album that is shaped like a gift box? It's called an explosion box. The is a tutorial on SCS that can be found here.
For the gift box I made, there is only the first layer. The box is 3 1/2 x 3 1/2 square. I decorated the outside of the box with 3 1/4 3 1/4 squares using dp from last years Winter Bright Simply Scrappin and the matching stickers. I thought the sticker snowflakes in the pack were a bit big for the box so I used 2 sizes of EK Success snowflake punches for the snowflakes on the box.
I added white grosgrain ribbon to the sides and top of the box so it looked like the box was tied on the top with the ribbons.


The bow on the lid of the box is hand made and I used the dp in from the same scrappin pack.
There is also a tutorial on SCS for the bow which can be found here.
I made my bow a bit different. I used 8 - 1x7 strips, 9 - 1x6 strips, 1 - 1x5 strip.
There are two layers of the 1x7 strips, 2 layers of the 1x6 strips and I rolled up the 1x5 strip then rolled up the last 1x6 strip around that. I also used regular glue dots to hold the layer together. This left less open areas in the bow.

This is the inside of the box. I also used the simply scrappin pack to decorate the inside of the box. The stand to hold the gift card was made with the same idea that Gina used for her cards. She gave instructions on how she made it on one of blog post which you can find here.

I used a 3x6 inch strip and scored it at 1 1/2, 3, and 4 1/2. I put a piece of double sided tape just after the 3 inch score line and folded the strip so the 1 1/2 and 4 1/2 score lines matched up. (simple terms - fold it in half). folded out the two ends so it is standing up. I used a rectangle nestibilities that fits the gift card to cut out the notch for the gift card. Now you should have a little pocket the gift card slides into. When the two ends of the strip are folded out the holder will be standing up. I attached this to the boxes middle square. The dp helps hide the holders 'legs'.

Here is a different view of the open box.
I added rhinestones to the center of the snowflakes inside the box but I see I forgot them on the outside. Oops! I will have to fix that...hehehe!

Have a great day!

Sharri