DIY Retro Inspired Gift Box for Mother’s Day

Mothers make our lives possible and blissful, and any day of the year is a great opportunity to celebrate the shared memories that bound us together. Here’s an idea for a retro-inspired gift box that you can put together for her in minutes.

You will need

• A box to store various small items and gifts
• Shredded wood excelsior, which we’ll use as a gift box filler
• Inkjet sticker paper to print the labels. Alternatively, you could glue regular cardstock onto each object.
• Fresh flowers. Make sure you have different colors and leaves (in addition to flowers) to work with.
• Assorted artisanal sweets like nougats and cinnamon rolls
• Chocolate bars. I went for Toblerone, a classic Swiss chocolate bar with the advantage of having a box with three flat surfaces. Because we will decorate each of these items, having flat areas will make adding labels much easier.
• A small scented candle of your choice. I chose a hand poured french vanilla and coconut candle.
• Tea bags
• A perfume or scent of your choice to spray the gift box filler.
• Small wine or champagne bottles. I used Sutter Home’s White Zinfandel 4-Pack
• Stamps, stickers, or confetti to decorate the box (optional)

Steps

1. Print out customized labels for:
   1. The chocolate bar
   2. The personal wine bottle
   3. The candle
   4. A tag to seal the box
2. Cut the labels and paste them onto each object.
3. I like to spray some perfume or home scent spray on the gift box filler (wood excelsior, in this case) to add a special aroma when the recipient opens the box. This is not necessary but adds a unique touch to the experience of opening your gift box.
4. Assemble the box as follows:
   1. Wood filler
   2. Larger objects like the candle, wine bottle, and cinnamon roll. Adding these first will help you identify spaces for the rest of the tiny objects more easily.
   3. Smaller items like tea bags, chocolate bars, and nougats
   4. Fresh flowers
   5. Seal the box with the tag you printed