Baby Pail Tutorial

Jameson’s teacher is having a baby due  in August. So instead of a teacher-themed gift, I decided to make a baby gift. I mean after all, teachers aren’t just teachers, they are people too! I emailed her to ask the gender of the baby but I didn’t get an answer in time so I made it yellow, white and green. Funny thing is, I am tickled pink about it! I just love it! I am going to add a few gender-appropriate coloured ribbons to the handle because now I know! I guess I can list it here because my son doesn’t read my blog. The teacher is going to keep it a secret from them and have them guess-boy or girl. Since I love this project so much, I decided to make a tutorial for covering and decorating the pail. (Sorry about the picture, I took at least 20 pix with different settings. The colours are too grey, especially the celery front panel, the shadows too dark and the handle is blurry, don’t worry, there is a close up of the handle later!)

Step 1: Choose your paper. For this type and size of pail, you will need 2 sheets of 12x12 designer paper (DP) to cover the pail, 1 sheet of a coordinating paper and three colours of 8.5x11” cardstock. I think I ended up using 2 of each celery and white and one of banana. You could use two different patterned papers to cover the pail, but then you will have to be WAY more precise with your placement to get it even on both sides. I don’t recommend it.

Step 2: I started with my lid. Use a circle cutter or appropriate sized circular item to trace and cut cardstock. Cut another, slightly smaller, circle from the single sheet of DP. (I ended up using two different kids bowls from IKEA to cut mine.) Cut the largest of the large set of scalloped circle Nesties from cardstock. I embossed mine with a Cuttlebug embossing folder. It just fits the width of the folder! Cut another from the largest of the small set of plain circles. Stamp a background on it or embellish it with stamping or die cuts. Adhere in layers as shown here. I used a SU! bear which I sponged to give him more depth and rosy cheeks.

Step 3: Cover your pail. This part can be a bit tricky. Measure your pail height in several places, average them and cut both of your sheets of DP . Be sure to cut them both with the same side up. My pattern isn’t too directional and I noticed after that I had cut mine differently! I added ribbon to the top and bottom of my pail so I didn’t have to be too careful. But I recommend you try to be accurate because it gives you more room for goofs! Mark your paper where the handle goes. You can see my marks in the photo. I placed the smallest small Nestie circle (I think) under the paper because I didn’t have a punch the right size. The paper is too large for my Cuttlebug so I simply pressed my finger over it and it gave me an impression strong enough to see and cut along. Even if you use a punch or a have a larger die cutter, you still need to make a small slit from the edge of the paper into the circle. Mine needed a fair bit of trimming (larger) but I finally got it PERFECT! Wrap your paper tightly around the pail, making sure the paper doesn’t slip from it’s position over the handle attachment. Mark the edge of the paper with your fingernail, pressing it right down into the groove between the pail and the handle attachment. (Photo below) Use this mark as the starting point for marking the placement of your second circle cut out. Measure down from the top the same amount as you did on the previous circle, mark and cut. Because I had to trim so  much in addition to the size of Nestie shape I cut for circle one, on the second side, I tried using one size larger Nestie and it was too big. GRRR! It also ended up a bit off  (photo below) so make sure that your wrap tightly, I must have had it a bit too  loose when I marked mine. Now you can do it your own way, but I will deliberately offset my cut circle slightly next time! And I figured out how to get the perfect size circle  between sizes. This time I layered and pressed BOTH of the Nesties I had used before  into a scrap to repair my handle, I found that by cutting EXACTLY between them gave me the size I needed. I slipped my scrap underneath and you wouldn’t even see it. So don’t stress if it isn’t perfect the first time. You can fix it unless your patterned paper is difficult to match. Next step is to cover the back of the pail first. I think the seams should face to towards the back, therefore  hidden from the eye which they will be if the front overlaps the back. So the back paper goes on first. The back piece will be cut to the length between the handle attachments.  No more cutting out the circles! Stick it on with red line tape or similar adhesive. I used several small pieces rather than one large one. It made it more manageable when applying it and was easier to keep it straight.  Now apply the piece with the holes. If you wish, you can trim the second side to match the first as the holes will likely be different distances from the paper’s edges. I didn’t bother. Apply with adhesive the same as the back. Tricky part over!

Step 4: Create the front panel. The green cardstock is 8.5” wide and the white is 7.5” wide but I don’t have the other measurements and the punch took some off anyway. This is the fun part!! Decorate this panel anyway you like. I used a Sizzix alphabet to cut my letters. You could of course stamp them, use letter stickers or rub-ons. TIP: If your letters are small enough, put several dies through on one ‘crank’. I managed to do all those letters with only two passes. I lost the dot for the letter ‘i’ so I cut the prongs off of a brad, used dimensional glaze to fill in the back and once it was partially set I added it to the white panel. Not only did I forget to put the brad through the paper until after the layer was adhered, of course! but I also wouldn’t want the brad prongs to show through. My BFF makes these gorgeous Irish crocheted flowers. Email me if you want to order some of these. We haven’t set up the official post yet but she is almost ready to make more. Any colour, minimum order of $8 CAN. (There are other styles too, mix and match) We can match floss to SU! or PTI colours or send us the floss colour numbers you want.

Step 5: Finish any other decorating you choose. Maybe add a ‘Made by…” tag on the back or add ribbon to the top and bottom edges like I did. I put my ‘made by’ tag on the inside of the lid. Along with my contact info, I’d love to make these to sell!

Step 6: Decorate the handle. I chose to use a bunch of tags but you can use ribbons or any little embellishments you can glue to ribbon. I suppose you could glue them right to the handle too. Buttons would be cute… I made a special tag with a poem I wrote on it. Please feel free to copy and share it but please put my name at the bottom. (yeah I know my handwriting sucks)

Memories never seem to last,
Kids grow up quick, much too fast.
Put special things into this pail,
Come back later, they’ll tell the tale,
Of how they were when they were small,
And then you will remember all.
Rebecca Ednie

(Feel free to replace ‘they were’ with ‘he was’ or ‘she was’ if you wish, I didn’t know the gender.)


The middle tag is a bit too big (I already trimmed it some) but I like it anyway. I used SU! markers to colour the images.

That’s it! I hope you like it as much as I do. One last thing, open up the pail and you get this…
…8 cards with matching envelopes! I also wanted to add a small notebook with pages listing special dates, occasions and ‘firsts’, kind of like a baby book but just for her to write in things quickly before she forgets. She can scrapbook them or write them in a proper baby book later.
 

Enjoy, Rebecca

RECIPE
Ink: Memento brown, banana, celery, pretty in pink, pink pirouette
Stamps: various SU! baby sets, baby set by Fiskars,
mini heart background-Hero Arts
Paper: celery, banana, pink pirouette, white CS, DP
Accessories: ribbon-Offray, striped ribbon-Taylored Expressions, Nestabilites, Cuttlebug embossing folder, Markers, word window punch, large and small tag punches, Crop-a-dile, green and baby shoe brads-stash, Sizzix alphabet. All products by SU! unless otherwise noted.