Something I think is fun to do is to take a shopping bag you got at a store and turn it into a gift bag, like this Altered Spring Lamb Gift Bag. The other day when I was cleaning out my “bag of bags”, I came across this small kraft shopping bag I got at one of my favorite gift shops. This bag is about 6″ x 7″ which was perfect for adding this stamped panel to the front of the bag! Even if the bag has printing, such as the name of the store or company, just cover it up with your stamping elements.
This bag already had the white border line around the bag with the store name printed in the middle. This was the perfect size to add my stamped decoration for the front of the bag and turn it into a spring gift bag, maybe for Easter
It was really like making a card, I just made the piece to fit the front area of the bag. The lamb is from the Springtime Joy Stamp Set, very popular right now with Easter coming up soon! The lamb is stamped in Memento Black Ink so I could color him with Stampin’ Blends Markers.
When I looked at the greetings in the stamp set, it seemed I should place the lamb off to the side and put the greeting, layered, right there on the other side. I wanted the lamb to be white, but I used the Light Smoky Slate Stampin’ Blend to just add a bit of color by the fluffs of wool and here and there. Then I also colored the flowers and leaves.
The greeting is stamped and then die-cut with a die in the Stitched So Sweetly Dies. For the layers underneath I just cut out rectangles with my Paper Trimmer.
For embellishments, I stamped a butterfly off to the side of the lamb and colored it with Stampin’ Blends. I also stamped the basket of eggs, colored it, and then cut out with Paper Snips. I decided not to pop it up with Dimensionals and just glued it down flat next to the lamb. Also, that little chick is so cute, I stamped, colored and cut him out and glued him down at the corner of the greeting. Now after all this, if you get a smudge of ink on your work, just add another butterfly to cover it up!
The whole decorative piece is layered on Blushing Bride and then Pear Pizzazz Cardstock. It is centered inside that white border line and looks perfect on this shopping bag turned into a gift bag! You can do this for any occasion! If you don’t have a cute little shopping bag, you can purchase plain bags at the craft store and decorate those. This is especially fun (and useful!) to do before Christmas so you have plenty of gift bags ready for gift wrapping like this Christmas bag.
Look through your bags and see if you have some shopping bags you can alter for whatever occasion you need like this Altered Spring Lamb Gift Bag I did using the Springtime Joy Stamp Set, perfect for a small Easter treat or gift!