Tudor House Gift Box

The start of the gift box Cutting out the windows and adding the window scenes.

Ok here it is the gift box I designed and made for Sue who retired this week after more than 30 years at our school. As she is a lover of Doll's houses it seemed appropriate to make the gift box with that theme.

I have spent every afternoon for the last two to three weeks working on this secretly in school and almost jumping out of my skin every time somebody came to my door just in case it was Sue. It was her on one occasion, but I managed to head her off at the pass, so to speak.

I stamped the lovely as a tree stamp on the acetate windows using Black stazon ink and white craft ink on the black card for the moon and the mist reflections. I sandwiched some lace between the black card and the acetate with double sided tape.

The hanging baskets where made from pulp paper balls that I cut in half and using a hot glue gun I added three lengths of chain from a broken necklace. I glued and poked some purchased flowers into the balls punched some fern leaves glued them to wire and poked them into the balls. I filled in all the gaps in between with glue and flower soft.

After papering the outside of the box with brick effect paper I glued strips of balsa wood and grey card which I had painted dark brown onto the outside of the box.

The wall plaque was made from air dry modelling clay for the centre I used a mould and the lettering was done using an alphabet set of rubber stamps.

Most of the flowers in the Garden are made from flower soft on wire but for the bushes I used some grass darts which I spotted on my way back to school after lunch. So I picked them and brushed the wispy strands with PVA glue and sprinkled them with flower soft.

I used peel off s for the door hinges, coloured black with a permanent marker pen. The door handle is a black brad the key was a charm, which I used a black marker pen on then coated in PVA.

The grass is the fibre stuff used by model railway enthusiasts, you sprinkle it on to a surface that has been coated with PVA. Rather like applying glitter really.

I painted the inside lilac and stamped the inside with Stampin up's white craft ink using the Vintage Vogue stamp set. The ink took days to dry which was a little unexpected and disappointing.

The Gifts were placed inside the the house through the roof.

The back of the roof lifted to reveal all the gifts.

Sue loved it.