SPOILER ALERT: If you are part of my family, the following is what will arrive in the mail for your birthday this year. Avert your eyes if you relish surprises:)
One of my 2012 goals is to send everyone in my family a birthday card…on time. Three birthdays have already passed (we’re only on Jan 20th, folks!) and I scrambled to get cards together and in the mail. I’ve got an upcoming solution for the scrambling part, but you’ll have to hold tight for that. The DIY we’re tackling today was the solution to feeling like I wanted to include a little something with each card, but what would be cute, simple, and still fit in a regular envelope?
I thought about a little $5 gift card to Starbucks, but that felt weird for the nieces and nephews. Dave suggested amazon.com gift cards, but you can’t really get much on amazon with $5 and I didn’t want it to be just a $5 discount card. My favorite idea was a gift card to buy a fun birthday cupcake and make a birthday wish, but with my family spread from Portland to Boston to Buenos Aires, it was impractical to try to get a local bakery gift card for each of the 40 recipients. Then I came up with this:
A “make a wish, on us” gift card with an origami cupcake $5 bill to be used for a cupcake and candle (or whatever else they might want…)
(Disclaimer: bill being used in photos is, in fact, a $10. I am sending $5’s, but didn’t have one when I took the pictures…Yeah, I’m a high roller.)
I designed and cut the cards with my Silhouette (I have been having a blast with that baby), but you could easily hand write the words and sketch the designs, or print on the computer then cut the cupcake liner with an xacto knife. The cards are a little larger than business card size, about 2.5″ x 3.4″. Small enough to tuck inside a birthday card.
I am no origami guru, so I just made up the super simple folding method to fit!
Simply fold in half width wise.
Fold in half again.
Fold the top corners down, leaving the center third unfolded.
Fold in one side to the center.
Fold the other side into the center, making a nice little cupcake hexagon.
Now, simply tuck the bottom end into your cupcake liner, and you’re finished!
I am loving putting these together and sending them off! And I’ll be honest, it’s even more cute with a $5 bill, because you can fold it so almost the entire cupcake top is plain white! Darling, right?
I love the idea of being able to customize the little money gift this way, and already have ideas floating around for money gift cards for other holidays!
If you got this in the mail for your birthday, what is the chance you would use it to actually buy a cupcake?
Have an enjoyable weekend!
