Whatever Wednesday: Gift Card Holder Tutorial

It’s that time of year again!  I’m sure all of you moms with school aged kids know what I’m talking about …. our kids are counting down the days, and us?……well…..we’re counting down the days too, only some might argue from the opposite perspective: "How in heaven’s name are we going to keep the kids occupied all summer?" Yes, you guessed it, school is almost over.  For my kids, school ends on Friday, so I’ve been busy making my end of the year teacher gifts.  Over the years, after making different kids of teacher gifts, I’ve finally settled on Chapter’s gift cards (for those of you not familiar with Chapters, it is a large chain of bookstores in Canada – not sure if it’s in the US or not) .  I find that gift cards are appreciated because then the teacher can buy whatever they want with it, and what teacher doesn’t like to read, or isn’t on the lookout for neat new resources for the next year?

If you’re a new reader, Whatever Wednesday is when I share with you any Stampin’ Up! creations that I am currently working on. Since I figure there are probably at least a few of you out there who will be giving gift cards, I thought that for Whatever Wednesday, I’d share with you a gift card holder I designed , and I created a tutorial for you in case you want to make some yourselves!  You can see the inside of the gift card holder in the picture below.  I’ll apologize in advance though as I wasn’t as careful as normal when taking my pictures so some are not as clear as I’d like.

Download the Template HERE

Step 1:  Take a 3 1/2" x 10 1/2" piece of CS and score at 3" and 7" (see template download).  You’ll notice from the template that there are 3 "sections". You want to line up the bottom edge of the MEDIUM sized of the three CS sections with the bottom of your grid paper.  Place a pencil mark along the bottom at 1 1/4" and another at 2 1/4".  Place a pencil mark at 1/4" on both the left and right sides.

Step 2: Take your word window punch, lign up the left side of the punch with the 2 1/4" pencil mark, and the top edge of the punch with the 1/4" pencil mark on the right side (your punch will look as shown) and punch.  Repeat on the other side. I do want to mention that this idea to create a "tab" using the word window punch is not my original idea.  I saw it done for the first time on Amanda Coughlin’s blog HERE.

Step 3: By punching both sides, you create a "tab" as seen in the picture below.

Step 4: You are now going to rotate your CS so that you are looking at the SMALLEST flap- this is the bottom flap.  Align your 1" circle punch with the center and punch out half a circle.

Step 5: This is what your cardstock piece now looks like:

Step 6: Close up the flaps so that the bottom flap (with the punched 1/2 circle) is on the inside.  In the picture below you are looking at the bottom of the card front. Take your pencil and make a little mark on either side of the "tab" at about the halfway mark as shown.

Step 7:  Open your CS back up, place this piece on a foam mat, and use your paper piercer to poke a hole through each of the pencil marks you made. I tried using the 1/16" handheld punch, but it didn’t have quite enough reach.

Step 8: On your craft mat, take a metal edged ruler and your craft & hobby blade and make a little slit in between the two pierced holes as shown.

Step 9:  Your tab will tuck into the little slot, holding the whole thing closed.

Step 10: Open your gift holder back up, and place a piece of sticky strip along each edge of the bottom flap as shown in the picture below.  Peel off the red backing and stick to the middle portion of the CS.

Step 11: This is what the inside of the gift card holder now looks like.  Decorate the front and inside as desired.