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The other day I cut a cereal box into 6 pieces size 2" by 4 1/2". I punched a hole in the end of each piece about 1/2" in from the end. I covered the chipboard pieces with DP and repunched the holes again. I embellished it with stamps, stickers, sticky gems, and bible verses. On the cover was the word "Inspirational". I then tied all the pages together with a pink satin ribbon. I gave this little book to my mom for her birthday present (a month early lol).
Sounds like a really great idea. Do you have pictures? We go through alot of cereal in our house so this would be a great way to recycle the boxes. Thanks for sharing.
You gals are great! I never thought about using cereal boxes like chipboard. I have such a hard time finding what I want in chipboard - now I have the idea to make my own. Thank you and happy crafting! Angela
I also use the cereal boxes when I make books as the book cover and back. You cover the front chipboard so no one knows what you used.
I also use it with my Nestabilities to cut & emboss at the same time. This is a hint from StampinChampin. Works in both the CB and Big Shot. Use it between the c/s and the top plate. (Base platform, acrylic plate, die - ridge up, c/s, chipboard, acrylic plate)
An empty Kleenex box will work too- I have even cut out shapes of nice patterns already on the box, it's the perfect thickness. Wohooo for free chipboard!!
Check out my gallery as I did nearly the same thing with my Friends Quote Book.....you can re-use any light cardboard box. Heck, I have even used the DSP cardboard that my LSS was throwing away.
Even after seeing the photo of your gift bag, I was thinking, I wonder what dimensions she used to cut out and piece together to make a gift bag. After a few minutes, I finally got it.
The lining for the cereal box "gift bag" is light weight tissue paper. I took the box apart neatly, covered the outside in the brown and white spotty gift wrap paper, ran double-sided tape along the inside edge along the top. Once I had put the box back together, I attached the tissue paper along the tape hap-hazardly so that it "puffed" a bit inside. The embellishments, ribbon and strip af pink and white spotty gift wrap paper were added afterwards to finish it off. We used the "gift bag" to hold our monthly lucky draw products for the December card class.
I doubt this cardboard is acid free, yet unless you are using it for scrapbooking of course, it is very useful. I am all for recycling trash into useful products. Our food products come in various sized boxes to make many different sized gift bags.
Great idea with the Kleenex box too thanks PiperGirl. ;)
I have been saving cereal boxes for a while, thinking I would use them in place of chipboard. I finally got around to cutting them apart and using them. They work great!
But I have found they are different colors/tones on the inside. I had one that was exactly the shade of the blank chipboard that SU sells and very heavy in weight. I took tombow glue and glued the printed out-sides of the box together...So it was twice as thick. Ran it through my big shot and literaly looked just like the one that I did with the SU chipboard! Very cool. I'll try and upload some pics later!
Last edited by Ruth Schow; 01-15-2009 at 07:14 AM..
Reason: added
Great idea to recycle for general projects but I use chipboard on scrapbook pages. Does anyone know if the cereal boxes are acid free?
I doubt very seriously if they are acid free, but they make something to take care of that little problem! It's called Make It Acid Free and it's made by Krylon. I coordinated my parents' 50th wedding anniversary a few years back and I wanted to include their original wedding announcement in a scrapbook. It had already started to brown and I didn't want it to damage the older surrounding photos,so I used this product . I bought mine at Walmart in the paint section and I think it was about $6. I've had the can for about 2 years, I think.
Hope this helps.
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What great ideas everyone has. It seems we go through oodles of cardboxes that go to the recycling container. This would make things way more practical. Glad I found this thread. TFS!!
__________________ Renee - SU! Demonstrator [url]http://reneefick.stampinup.net[/url www.marykay.com/rfick
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You could also use a smaller box, say Rice-a-Roni or Mac and Cheese size, to decorate and give gifts of handmade cards. I once used a box from a Sam's Club size of brownie mix to make a gift box for cards; the back edge came up over the cards and attached to the front to close. I used a very pretty floral vine wallpaper to cover it. They were large cards and so needed a bigger box. It came out very pretty. And sturdy, too.
I use a lot of these boxes. Instant oatmeal boxes work great to store cut cardstock, etc. Covering them with pretty paper adds sturdiness.
I also use different boxes for cuttlebug and other die cuts especially for the two piece butterfly - the actual picture of cheerios, for example, for the body, and a darker brown for the outline part creates a nice pattern. The berries from a berry pie box made cute two piece hearts (cuttlebug). No coloring needed!
Now that I am thinking of this, I am sure there are a lot of similar patterns that would work for the bg matting of circles and ovals - but I have not tried cutting chipboard with my CB and Nesties.
This totally slipped by me! I seem to craft with EVERYTHING that comes through our house but I never thought to use cereal boxes as chipboard. Duh! What a great idea! I am now digging them out of the recycling bin.
i use cereal boxes and gift boxes in my cricut. Works great
what settings do you use on the cricut,
do you have to use that special blade?
I was afraid to use the chipboard in my cricut,
but will try in my cuttlebug.
thanks for the tips!
Glad I came across this thread. I will look at all of my card board boxes in a different light!
On a different recycling note -- I use empty kleenex boxes on my craft desk to quickly dump trash into. When it's full you just throw the box away!
i almost kept a box sort of thing from the new healthy choice chinese food "bowls" the other day! the inside of it is orange and has a really fun pattern on it perfect for cards! i may have to eat another one. i can't stop thinking i should have kept it. i'm a lean cuisine fan really. teehee.
Glad I came across this thread. I will look at all of my card board boxes in a different light!
On a different recycling note -- I use empty kleenex boxes on my craft desk to quickly dump trash into. When it's full you just throw the box away!
That's another great idea. No wonder I love this site! BTW, what part of AK? I lived in Anchorage from 1974-1979 and LOVED it. We just went back, for the first time since we left, two years ago on the AK cruise and rented an RV and spent another week. Absolutely BEAUTIFUL country. Angela
This might have been mentioned before but, you could cut out shapes and make your own chipboard books. Such as butterflies, flowers, hearts, etc. and glue as many same shapes together to get the weight you desire. Paint or cover with DP, decorate with quotes or photos, embelish to your heart's desire!
I guess I need to quit buying my cereal in bags. I don't have any cereal boxes to play with :(
We buy the cereal in bags, too, so I was pretty bummed that I couldn't use any of these nifty ideas. So I started looking around and found lots of boxes that can be used for this. I am so excited!!
One time I took a cereal box apart and fused fabric to it, put it back together and put a baby gift inside of it. I got this idea from a Carol DuVall show many years ago!
A cool idea for an empty cereal box
