Laura Vegas

This week, over at Kerri Bradford Studio, we are focusing on "brown paper packages tied up with string", in honor of a very special birthday girl. That's right, TODAY is Kerri's birthday!! How fun that I get to share my projects on her actual birthday 🙂

When I was brainstorming what I would make for this week, I kept coming back to kraft gift bags. I always have a stash of kraft gift bags on hand, for easy and quick gift giving. It doesn't matter if I'm giving a birthday gift, a baby gift, a Mother's Day or Father's Day gift, or even a Christmas gift. A kraft gift bag is neutral enough to use for any occasion.

I always have intentions of decorating the bag, but 10 times out of 10 (not even kidding), I end up handing over a plain kraft bag. When Kerri brought up the idea of "brown paper packaging", I knew it was the perfect push to decorate a few of these kraft gift bags.

I played around with quite a few of Kerri's designs, and even die cut quite a few of her designs, before finally settling on these feathers from the Feathers kit. I have a large supply of feathers from Bella Blvd, and I knew I could work them in right along her cut files.  

I cut a few feathers from white cardstock, and then ran them thru a chevron embossing folder to add some texture. The chevron embossing folder probably wouldn't have been my first choice, but it was the only large embossing folder I had, and these feathers were big. 

I adhered the die cut feathers to the front of the bag, right along with a few Bella Blvd feathers. From day one, I have always said that the easiest and best way to adhere the real feathers is with a stapler. So I just inserted one of my foam pads into the bag (while it was still folded and flat), placed the feathers where I wanted them, and stapled them down with the stapler open. I then flipped it over, reached inside and pushed down the ends of the staples.

To add my sentiment across the feathers, I cut a few banners, from the Banners kit, out of kraft cardstock. I adhered these the same way I adhered the feathers, but using brads instead of staples. I pulled the "happy birthday" from the Happy Birthday kit, and cut it from black cardstock and blue cardstock to layer together.

I also thought the daisy, from the This & That: Spring [Shapes Only] kit, would be fun to use. I had a few smaller gift bags that I wanted to decorate as well, one of them being a polka dotted bag, which is kind of fun.

For the die cut daisies, I cut 3 of the flowers, in varying sizes, from white cardstock. I layered them together, adding adhesive only to the center of the flowers, so that the petals could curl up a bit, and added a threaded button the center.

I also added some quick pen lines around the edges of the daisies, just to break up all of the white and bring in a little more touch of black. I picked the "celebrate" from the Something To Say kit.

I wasn't actually planning on adding a real feather to these smaller bags, as my plan was to place the daisy in the center of the bag. But since the feathers were out already, I decided to add one to each bag, tucked behind the layered flower.

Kerri is also doing some giveaways on her blog this week, so you should be checking in every day this week. I contributed some Bella Blvd goodies for today's giveaway. If you head over to Kerri's blog and leave a comment, you'll be entered for a chance to win. US residents only. You can get in on all of the giveaway thru Saturday, and all winners will be announced on Monday.