 Hi everybody, it's Sam at Mixed Up Craft and thank you for watching my tutorial today. I thought I would do a fun gift box. I haven't done a good size gift box for a while, so I have this four by four by three, fully reinforced gift box with this firework topper, which I'm naming it a firework topper, or a fountain topper. It was really, really fun and totally came about by accident, so I will show you how to make that. And then I finished off here with this little happy birthday tag. And I'll show you those dies as well, because they're really fun. And it just opens up like so, and you can see there, it's all reinforced inside as well. So it does use three pieces of 12 by 12 paper. So it's a luxury gift box, so one to do for those real special gifts, or as a really nice storage box in your craft room, bedroom, wherever, I think it would work really well with that as well. So very straightforward to make, as always. Don't like complicated things. So today I'm using these papers here, which I was so excited to get my hands on. They are gorgeous. This is very much my style. Excuse the dried glue there. That was from the box I've just made, so I'm just gonna peel that off actually, because it's gonna irritate me otherwise. Okay, that's better. Back to the papers. So these are the Let's Celebrate Fest Edition papers. I love 12 by 12 paper packs. And as always with the Fest Edition, they're the ones I'm using today. You can see all of these up to here are all double-sided, and then the rest of the pack are single-sided, but they're more of the luxury papers, or the fun kind of papers. So look at these. Just brilliant. So much fun. The cake's there. This one here with the foiled balloons. And you've got the confetti. Just really, really good. And then the double-sided ones are here. You can see they're just corresponding sides, so they all work really, really well together. And I just know I'm gonna get so much use from them, like I already have today with these boxes. So I have chosen these three here. You get three of each design, so it worked perfectly for this gift box. So I'm gonna use these ones here. So it's another birthday style, and you'll need your scoreboard. And you're gonna score two of them exactly the same. So, but you're gonna do them, let me just take these apart, so I've still got the join on them. There we go. Right, so the first one, you want to score with your print facing up, and you're gonna score at three and at nine. So sorry, three pieces of 12 by 12. I don't know if I did mention that. I said you needed three, yeah, three pieces of 12 by 12, I did mention it. And then again, three and nine. Okay, so just three and nine on both sides of one piece with the print facing up. Then on the second piece, with your print facing down, because it just makes it, it's just nicer when you fold. You're not folding your folds one way and then folding them another way so you weaken the score line and obviously risk cracking. So these ones here are gonna be for our base and our lid, so you want your print facing away from you. If you're using double sided, that's okay, but you still will need cards to reinforce it if you want. So it's entirely up to you if you want to reinforce the middle. You'll see that in a minute, so it's very easy to have that or not. I just prefer reinforced boxes, especially when they're bigger like that, just because they can hold heavier items. So again, with this one here, this is gonna be our base. So this one, you're gonna score at three and again at nine and then rotate three and nine. Okay, so you've got two pieces scored exactly the same, but one you've scored with your print facing up and one with your print facing down. Then with the last piece, you're gonna score again with your print facing down and this time, you're gonna score at, so this is our lid, our reinforced lid, so you're gonna score it one and a half and three and then nine and 10 and a half and then rotate and do the same. So one and a half, three, nine and 10 and a half. Okay, so there we have all of our score lines done. So let me get rid of this and then we can now start vanishing everything. So we do our lid last, we will just concentrate on the base for the moment. So it doesn't matter which piece you wanna start with, if it's the piece where you scored on top of your white, you wanna fold everything accordingly so you're folding it all up, okay? And then with this piece, you're folding down. So now this piece here is gonna be on the bottom and these sides are gonna come up and you're gonna see all your lovely design and this piece here and I've done it that way. One of them I've folded the wrong ones, I've folded them both the right, I've folded them both the same way. What was I just saying? Okay, let me remember. So this one is the one that I should have folded that way. There we go. So basically, this is the one that is gonna sit inside this one to give us that nice pattern inside and reinforce it. But again, when I get to it, it's gonna make more sense. So the one where you folded up this way with the print facing the outside, we're gonna cut first. So it just doesn't really matter with, yeah, but I guess I want that to be my front. So this is gonna be the front, so you want to cut down the side, score line here. This is just so you get a nice looking box when you look on front ways, like so. And then again, like so. So you're just cutting straight down like that. Then on the inside bit, you just want to take a little wedge out, like so, okay? And it would just mean you don't get any kind of bulky overhanging bit. And I'm just gonna trim off a little bit of that score line there. It's just not finished off as neat as I want it to. Once you see this all put together, you'll totally understand what I'm going on about. Just take that off as well. Because we've got a piece going inside another piece that's exactly the same size, you need to make sure you do all these little bits here just so you get a really, really snug fit. Okay, so we've just done that one. So now what we're gonna do is we're gonna stick all these tab pieces inside, like so, and bring up our sides. And that will form a normal base for your box, but it's not reinforced. I guess these side bits here are kind of reinforced. So we just grab your glue, flip it over, and on these square tabs here, you just want to bring your glue, you're just gonna stick each one like so. And you just wanna make sure you've got nothing overhanging from the top there of this piece that we've just stuck in. And that's why if you're taking out that little wedge down there, it will stop that happening. So you're just getting much nicer finish. Pop it on its side. If you've got a bone folder, just use that just to spread out any glue and just to make sure you get a really nice join. And then again, get your next one, and bring your glue all over that tab and just pop that one inside the next one. And just kind of, you can wiggle them around a bit, you've got the room too, just to make sure that you get a really nice join. And again, I'll pop that one on its side. So, and then you just wanna do the same with the end ones here. So again, just gonna pop my glue on this one here and on that other one, and just stick them down exactly the same way. Okay, so right now you've got this relatively flimsy, but very nice looking steel box. And obviously my print is directional, so I just wanna make sure that I've got these, you know, presents and the hats and stuff facing up the right way, so that I know is my front. Okay, so that's that piece. Now this bit here, what you've gotta do is go around and cut out each of the squares in each of the corners. You wanna make sure you remove the score line as well, so you wanna take out all that bulk. So I'm just cutting to the left-hand side of that one, and then the right-hand side of this score line. So you just wanna take it out completely, because this is gonna basically sit inside this piece very, very snug, but it does work. So again, you just wanna make sure that you take out the bulky score lines on each of these corners. Okay, but don't throw these pieces away, keep them, because that's what we're gonna use to make our little firework or little fountain topper. All right, so everything gets used. So now that is gonna fit inside here, but before you put it in, you will find that the tops of these pieces here will just poke out the top of here, because obviously it's sitting on top. Rather than me telling you to cut this down to 11 and 15, 16ths, which confuse lots of people and not everybody has the scoreboards that show that measurement, it's just easier. You very carefully just go along each edge and just cut off that amount. You can see there it's just a curly sliver. And just literally the tiniest amount so you get that little curly spiral coming off. And it's just easier for me to tell you to do that than having all these funny score lines that we would have to do. This is the way to keep it easy. So one of mine's thicker than the other slightly, but it really won't matter once you see what it will do. So you can see how thin they are. All right, right. So now, basically this is gonna sit inside. Now it is snug, but it will go, I promise you. So in fact, no, before we put that in, just remembered we've got to do the lid because one side of the lid's got to go in. So let's just have those two pieces prepared and now we can do the lid here. So we've done all those score lines. You just want to burnish all of them. Okay, so they're all burnished, all right. Then what you will have, so if I flip it over, you'll have these four squares in each of your four corners, okay. So it doesn't matter which one you start on, they're all gonna be the same, but what you want to do is cut down. So you've got this score line here and then the second one coming in here from the right-hand side. Just cut all the way down and you want to go past that first score line down to this second score line. So pass that one down to this one. And then again, with this one, you want to go down to the same. Then rotate it and cut that whole piece out. So again, those of you that have watched a lot of my tutorials will know exactly what you're doing here. So you can just whiz through and cut this down so it's all ready to fold in. So once you've then created this little tab here, you just want to take a couple of wedges out of both sides. Again, this just helps fold it all together and then take a very tiny amount off of the outer edge there. And again, with that one there, okay. So that is one of the corners. Go along to this one and do exactly the same. So you want to cut all the way down. Pass that first score line down to the second and again with that one. Remove both of those pieces and then just remove that top one. And that is how this here, you know, I always do, this is how you do a reinforced lid. It's the same process, it'd just be different sizes but you will always do this to create that reinforced finish. And then again, just the two outer bits just take a wedge off. Okay, so that is what I've got. These two longer pieces, two little ones there. Then flip the whole thing around. So now this is all facing away from you and do exactly the same again. So down these ones and this one and this one and then just cut them all out the same way. Okay, so that is now what you should have. So what we're gonna do is now we need to cut more away. I just wanted to do that way because it's just easy to tell you all but this piece here, well, depending on the direction, yeah, so I want that, this is gonna be the front. This is the top facing me. This is gonna be the front side facing me. So this here is the back. So I'm now gonna remove these completely. I probably could have said that to you but I just wanted to show you that if you just cut it all that way that's just one nice reinforced lid. Now we're making it that kind of hinged lid. Okay, so just remove them completely. Now what's gonna happen, so that's the front, is this piece is gonna stick. Now I know we've burnished it and again once you watch this and you're like, well actually we don't even need to score that side. That's fine, I'm just trying to show it the easiest way but by folding this it makes no difference to the final look of it. That is gonna stick inside right down and flush like so. So the whole piece is stuck in there like that. Before we do that we wanna put the rest of the lid together. So I'm gonna use a different glue because Tombow's good but it gets so tacky whereas this stuff doesn't. And everybody always asks me where everything is from. Please, please, please check out my blog because I do fill it with lots of information and on the, this is the Aleene's Glue and I'm sure I've added it if not I'm going to but I have a section on the top of my website that says the tools I use or the tools I love and on there it has all the things that I use every single day. So please just look at that first. So many people messaged me asking me what things are and it's listed. So obviously I can't say in every tutorial every single thing I use in terms of my tools. Otherwise I'd be here all day. So please just revert to the blog because it's got lots of bits and it's always shared in the video description below all of my tutorials. If the recent blog hasn't come up yet it's just because I post my tutorials to go up at midnight every other day and obviously I'm asleep. They're all scheduled. So when I wake up that next day is when I do the blog. So I know for some of you where you're obviously behind time you're getting my tutorial during the day. I know that may be frustrating because the blog isn't ready but I'm sorry. It just worked good that way for me. So anyway, so now I've just stuck those two tabs inside there to create your corners of your lid and then what you wanna do is put glue on the outside long kind of strips here on these side pieces like so and just fold them all in. And then again with my bone folder I'm just gonna spread out all of that glue like so. And just work your way around and do that on those other two sides. Okay, so that is now what you will have and that is the back and this is now our hinged lid. So I mean some people know if you haven't scored along that score line or even if you had like I have you put it in there and this is gonna come down over the front. A lot of you may like that and there is nothing wrong with that personally for me. I can't stand a flimsy gift box. It's gotta have a bit more structure to it and when this glue dries, it dries so hard that when you reinforce something those two pieces of paper sandwich together just become very, very strong. So I just this just I can't stand. Sorry, it's not me. So always keep in mind the front of your box. So again, this is my front. So this is the back. What I'm gonna do now is put, let me get my glue out. Glue on the printed side of the back of this lid, okay? So you wanna cover both of those pieces. Like I said, it makes no difference that you scored it. It was just easy for me to get you to this point. Like so. So again, this is my front. This is the back. I'm gonna pop it in and then put it on its side and just make sure the bottom piece is at the bottom of your box. If that's all lined up flush against the bottom then you know that it's not gonna go over at the top and just spend some time spreading out all that glue and just making sure that it all sticks down perfectly. Okay, so that one's now stuck down and then that will come over and fit nicely over the front like so. Okay, and you've got a nice back there. But now like I said, it's still quite loose. You can just kind of fold that right over but this is all too loose. Now that's when this piece comes in. So like I said, it is gonna be very snug but you want it to be like that and I promise you it will go in. So first of all, just do a test run and just get the front two sides in first like so. You need it to all kind of sit on all four corners at the same time. Don't go down, you know, one side so it won't go in. Do you see that I've got it in on all of my four sides? Then push the whole thing down and get it right into the corners like so. So just go around and just look that none of, see, because we took that slither off, it doesn't overhang. So there's that piece there but when I lie them down, they're completely flush. Just go around and just check that it's like that on all of them. So I've got a little bit coming up there but what I can do there is just literally just snip that piece off there like so. And it's all okay around the other side. So now take it back out and then we can put glue. I'm gonna glue all of the bottom first and then glue the sides once it's all in the box. It's much, much easier. So just kind of focus on the edges really and just enough in the middle for it to stick in side. So again, just get all the corners in and the rest will all follow suit like so and then just push like that. And then I'm just gonna grab my ruler and just get that right into each of the corners. Make sure it's right pushed down and it's really snug. And when we took out all of the squares in the corner that we were gonna use in a bit by removing them, it gives you a really nice join with these pieces here on the edges here. I'm gonna get that one. You just join up perfectly. You don't get any other white box showing through. So like I said, now when this glue sets, I bring in this one. This box is solid now from how flimsy it was to start with. So it really does, it is worth it. So now the base is stuck down. All you wanna do is fold down one of your sides and just pop the glue in. It's easier to do it this way than you get in a lot less mess by trying to glue all of it and then sliding it in. So just enough for it to stick. You don't need to go crazy, crazy. Pop it up, pop it on its side. And again, with your bone folder, get that glue all spread out and it will all help and just work your way around. So now pull down another side and cover it in glue and just do that on the rest of those sides. Okay, so that is all stuck down. And like I said, just go around and actually what I'm gonna do is use my snips here and just make sure that any of that kind of white isn't coming over the top. So now, already, that is starting to stiffen up. So there is a really nice reinforced box. Love it. I think it's so good, it's so handy and that is gonna be put to good use very soon. So I've got a nice gift going in mine. Okay, so now to make this fun decorative piece. Now, it doesn't really matter if the patterns are facing up the right way or not. I'm just gonna line mine up just for the sake of the video but you've got your four squares. Then what I'm using is these scissors I've used before. These are my mums, I've got the green ones. They are, there is a word for them. Can't remember what it is, it'll be in my blog but they're used for making your vegetables and your fruit and veg, that kind of stuff, looking fancy. Yeah, never use them for that, use them in the craft room. So you wanna get whatever, you know, your printed squares, are they gonna be the same? This is what were these, in case you have thrown them away, three by three, you want that, yeah. So you just wanna cut down and just create strips just like you would to make a tassel. So you don't wanna cut any off so just make sure you go along. Each one, get the very ends there, okay. Just do that on all four pieces. Okay, so you now have four pieces like this and then you wanna join them together so I'm gonna use the tacky glue this time. Just pop a splodge of glue just down in the bottom, right hand corner and get your other one and stick it over the top. Just, it's about a quarter of an inch in. You don't wanna go right inch, you don't wanna waste it. We now wanna create a long strip. So that's that one. Another little bit of glue just there. So we're gonna roll this up so you really do just need a little bit just to kind of grip them together. That one and then a little bit there. I like to find ways to use all my paper if possible so this is a good one I think. So you will now have, this is very tacky glue. You can see I'm sticking all over the place but that's good for this bit. So that's what we've got. Now when you do the tassel you would run glue over along this whole piece. We're not gonna do that with this because what we're gonna do is when we roll it up we're then gonna pull it through the middle to lift it up to create that kind of waterfall look. So what you wanna do now is grab a pair of, where did my fancy, I just have to use these ones. These aren't the ones I had. Can't seem to find them, tweezers. And just start off at the very end, okay? You wanna roll it right underneath the other piece like so, okay? See what I'm doing there? And just keep rolling it along and make sure you keep it lined up with the bottom of this. You don't really wanna go off track, okay? So just keep going all the way along. Oh, hang on, now I'm going the wrong way. I'm thinking it's starting to look completely different. You gotta go the opposite way because you want these to cascade out. Sorry, apologies, let's just turn that around. So you're gonna do your pattern inwards, okay? So like so. It's exactly the same but go, so you're rolling in the pattern and then what will happen, you see they all start to go outwards and they start to create that firework. So just keep rolling all the way along. I left about half an inch on the bottom. I don't think I mentioned that one, I said about it, but. So just keep it as lined up as possible. Don't worry if the inside starts lifting because you are actually gonna pull it up anyway. Like so. So when you get to the end, take your tweezers out, put a bit of glue on the end there. Okay, once that's all set, then what you can do, so you can move this all around a little bit, just pull any bits out that have maybe got caught up along the way. And we can always, I've got a few more there that need to be a bit more curled over. But what you wanna do is just grab any of the middle ones and just pull them up slightly. You can see how it starts to lift. You can have it as high or as low as you want. But if you've got any then, that's still a bit straight. Just hold the ends of them and then just go and just curl them over. So I'm just gonna go through and just kind of prune mine and shape mine and make it all look as much like a firework as possible because I think it looks so, so fun. And basically all your patterned paper should be what is kind of curved over and cascading. That's what you wanna see. I think that's pretty much there. I've got a couple of straight ones in the bottom. Let's just do that one there and that one there. There we go. So once you've pulled it up to the height that you want, you can play around with it again even once it's stuck down. I'm quite happy with that. We're gonna fill the inside with hot glue until it gets to the top. And then that's when you wanna actually stick it onto your box. So bring my box in here. I'm putting it right smack bang in the middle. So first of all, fill it up with hot glue. Be very careful. And obviously this will take a little bit longer to dry fully. So do you bear with it? Once you get to the top, I can see the glue dripping down inside. Once it gets to the very end, the glue will then start running down the other way once you turn it over. So already I can see it coming down now. You wanna just, once that glue starts dripping down, just stick it in the middle. Won't take long to initially stick to the top of the lid but the inside will take a bit longer to obviously fully set. Obviously if you're having it as a storage box, you won't be using this bit, but still I think this is a great topper idea just for any gift boxes that you're doing. So I'll just hold that up now. It's stuck down enough just to kind of set. So while that's doing that, I'm just gonna show you what I used to decorate. I've just got some scrap card here. And I picked up these dies recently from, gosh, I've got it all over me. It's got these little hot glue pieces, the stringy bits. I've got these here. I thought they'd be really handy and they have been. So you get one plain plate and then you get one, two, three, four, five, you get six with like patterns and words. So this one's with love, thanks and hello and love. Now you've got two patterned ones there. So I use the pattern and the plain and the, oh no, there's one more, happy birthday. There you go, that's the one I use and happy birthday. So you get loads, really good value for money. They were on offer, I believe they were, I wanna say 7.99 from Hobby Craft and I'll find links for them. So I've got the happy birthday with the plain one and the pattern with the plain. So you just die cut them all and then you layer them on top and that's what gives you these fun little tags. So there's the happy birthday. So I die cut the base, the plain base with the white card and then the pink is what's been cut in the happy birthday and that pattern. So I'm gonna go ahead and get all those cut, ready to go on the box and the glue should be set by them. Okay, so I've just die cut them both and just stuck them on the white and that's why I've got all the glue on my hands. I just find it easy when you die cut something, just dab it on your hand and then stick it directly on. Then I just wanna create little tags with them. So I've got my trusty tool here, which again is in that section on my blog and the tools that I use and it's got links on there. So I'm just gonna pop. I'm using the smaller of all, you get three sizes of whole sizes. So I've just put the smallest there and then I've just got a little bit of this like organza ribbon and it's just gonna tie around the bottom of the, the firework, the topper that I've made. I can thread this through, use my tweezers there and just sit it on top. I just like the two together. I just thought it just done something more really. You could put little embellishments on and might actually put some little embellishments either end or just put one there on that happy birthday. So just together like so, I can put two from on the back there. This is drying nicely now and then I'm just literally tying it around the bottom of my topper and then just cut off the edges there. Like I said, you can't see any of it and once you bring down and still pull some of the arcs that glues just drying in the middle. So if you play around with it, just once that glues set, you won't be able to move it anymore. And then I've just got my little happy birthday tags there. So I really love it. There you have it, two very good sized, like I said, four by four by three. You can put tissue paper in them as well and just all just using for storage boxes. They'd be great for that as well. But now, I mean, this one, like I said, this one's completely dry. The difference there where I'm hitting it, it's hardly moving, so it's solid. But it's just really nice inside. So that's that one. And this one is still drying a little bit more, but you can still see it's still drying nicely there. And those toppers are just so much fun. I absolutely love them. So there you have it. I hope you've enjoyed this gift box tutorial from me. I've just realized my phone's there. I need to message my husband. He's wondering why I'm replied. Yeah, hope you've enjoyed it. All the supplies, everything will be in my blog. But until next time, please hit the thumbs up if you've enjoyed today or subscribe to my channel to see more. Thanks for watching, bye.