DIY Upcycled Love Heart Gift Box

12th Jan 202513th Jan 2025 EsselleCraftsLeave a comment

Welcome to another upcycling project! This time I am going to show you how to turn an empty cheese triangle box into a super cute love heart gift box, perfect for Valentine’s Day! ❤️

Upcycled Love Heart Gift Box for Valentine's Day

You can include your own personal message inside, then fill the box with chocolates or other small treats and present it to that special someone in your life! ❤️

To make one of these boxes, you will need:

an empty cheese triangle box
pencil
paper
scissors
craft knife
sandpaper
white acrylic paint
pastel acrylic paints
paintbrushes
lilac or pale purple Sharpie
gloss varnish (optional)
craft glue
thin ribbon

You can watch my video tutorial to see me making one of these boxes, or simply follow the written instructions below:

First, fold a 7.6cm x 7.6cm / 3″ x 3″ piece of paper in half and draw half a heart shape onto it (I used a square Post-it note for mine). Cut this template out and draw around it onto the lid of the cheese triangle box. Cut the heart shape out carefully using a craft knife.

Using sandpaper, smooth any rough edges from where you have just cut. Then cover the lid, base and the cut out heart shape in two layers of white acrylic paint.

Once dry, paint the pieces in a light, pastel colour.

Next, using the Sharpie (a lilac or pale purple works well for this), colour around the outline of the heart shape on the lid approximately 2-3mm thick. Then, using a pencil, sketch your personal message onto the heart and colour over it with the Sharpie.

TIP : Leave it to dry, then apply a thin coat of clear acrylic gloss varnish to the painted pieces.

You really don’t have to be neat when doing the lettering as on the actual Love Heart sweets the purple is quite blotchy.

Glue the heart into the centre of the base, carefully lining it up so that it is visible when the lid is on.

Next, take some thin ribbon (or a thin strip of paper) and glue it around the middle of the base as shown below. This helps to neaten up the edges.

Press some tissue paper into the base and fill it with treats!

When the treats are taken out and the tissue paper is removed, your special personal message is revealed!

I really hope you enjoyed this cute Valentine’s Day upcycling project! ❤️ Once you’ve finished with the box, why not try popping a photograph inside it and hanging it on the wall as a photo frame

How to Make an Upcycled Love Heart Gift Box for Valentine's Day

Happy crafting and happy upcycling!
Suzanne

3D Papercraft Projects · Christmas Papercraft · Upcycling Projects

DIY Upcycled Christmas Card Baubles

6th Nov 202418th Feb 2025 EsselleCraftsLeave a comment

I’m a bit of a hoarder when it comes to paper craft. I’m always keeping old greeting cards, packaging, envelopes and even used Advent calendars and Christmas crackers – anything made of paper or card that I might be able to reuse. I have a stack of old Christmas cards that I’ve been slowly going through, and a few years ago I created these super cute Christmas card baubles!

Upcycled Christmas Card Baubles as Hanging Decorations

Aren’t they fabulous!?

They are so easy to make, and the best thing is you can use any materials left over from Christmas to decorate them, including ribbon bows, sparkly gems, stickers, etc.

To make one, you will need:

used Christmas cards / old Advent calendar / glittery card crackers
circle punch (I used a 1.5″ scalloped edge craft punch)
pencil
ruler
scissors
strong craft glue
thread, string, ribbon or wool for hanging

Watch my video tutorial to see me making one, or simply follow the written instructions below:

To begin, you will need to cut (punch) out twenty circles from the card (I’m using an old Advent calendar for this one). You could also draw around something circular for this, but they all need to be exactly the same size.

Cut another circle from a scrap piece of paper and fold it in half. Fold it again into exact thirds and open it out. Draw a triangle where every other point meets, and cut this out (it should be an equilateral triangle).

Using this triangle as a template, fold each of the twenty card circles as shown below. You could fold them against the edge of a ruler to make this easier.

Next, arrange the twenty pieces so that you have five for the top section, ten for the middle section and five for the bottom section. Think about how each of the pieces will look once they are all put together. Try not to have two pieces the same colour next to each other, and think about which way up they will need to face.

Starting with the bottom section, glue two pieces together, matching the edges up neatly. Then glue three more pieces on so that they form a circle. You can use mini pegs here to help hold the pieces together if you need to.

Do the same with the top section, but be sure to leave one edge open.

Take a length of thread, string, ribbon or wool (I used the string from a Chrsitmas tree chocolate) and knot the ends together. Slide the knot between the two open edges of the top section and glue the edges together. Pull the thread tight and apply a little glue to the inside to keep it securely in place.

For the middle section, glue the ten pieces together to form a long line, then join the ends together to form a collar.

Glue the bottom section on, taking care to match up all of the edges (use pegs if you need to). Repeat with the top section and leave to dry.

And here it is! A super cute Christmas decoration ready for next Christmas!

I also created this little beauty using non-recyclable glittery Christmas cracker card 🙂

Upcycled Christmas Cracker Glitter Baubles as Hanging Decorations

What will you create one out of?

DIY Upcycled Christmas Greeting Card Baubles

Happy crafting and happy upcycling!
Suzanne

3D Papercraft Projects · Christmas Papercraft · Upcycling Projects

DIY Upcycled Hanging Star Decorations

4th Nov 202418th Feb 2025 EsselleCraftsLeave a comment

Several years ago, I sorted through my huge pile of used Christmas cards, wondering what I could possibly do with them. Most of them had glitter on them and were donated to me because they couldn’t be recycled. So I started to think about ways to upcycle them. This led to new creations, including these fabulous hanging star decorations!

DIY Upcycled Christmas Card Hanging Star Decorations

I created a template (see below), which is about 7.5cm / 2.95″ high, and cut out as many as I could from the cards. Then I sorted them into groups of 5 and arranged them in the order that I wanted them to be. As they are double-sided, you will need 10 of this shape to complete one star decoration:

To make one, you will need:

used Christmas cards, greeting cards or card packaging
star template (see above)
pencil or pen
scissors or craft knife
ruler
scoring tool
strong, all purpose glue or double-sided tape
ribbon, string or thread

Here’s my video tutorial showing how to make the stars:

They really are a fabulous way of using up old Christmas cards. In fact, any type of greeting cards or card packaging can be reused to make these stars. They’re not just for Christmas!

DIY Upcycled Christmas Card Hanging Star Decoration

I still seem to have quite a large pile of used Christmas cards, so I will have a think as to what else I could make out of them!

Happy crafting and happy upcycling!
Suzanne 🌟