X is for eXploding boX

I'm getting creative here, both with today's Pinterest Challenge and with today's A to Z Challenge letter.

I happened upon this pin when I was searching frantically for something to do for "X":

http://www.creativehobbysupplies.blogspot.co.uk
/2013/08/exploding-box-tutorial.html

Obviously, I was pretty desperate to pick a Pinterest project this detailed when (a) I am nearing the end of the Challenge and (b) I have lost a lot of my will to produce quality posts.

But an exploding box? Exploding. Box. EXPLODING BOX? I'm in!

I stopped at Hobby Lobby where scrapbooking paper was 50% off and bought my paper supplies. I won't bore you with the details of this paper purchase; you just need to know that I needed several sheets of 12x12 cardstock for the box itself plus sheets of coordinating paper for decorating the box.

I had everything else on the list at home. Alllll except something called a bone folder/score board. Hobby Lobby was out of the little scoring tool (kind of a glorified plastic knife), and all they had were two different kits that included a plastic board with all kinds of grooves in it (I'm going to guess that is called a score board). One of them was $20 and one was $10. I walked away from them twice, telling myself I could just wing it on the project, but this little voice told me to do it right and get the kit. (That same little voice told me by no means to get the $20 one, though.)

Starting with a 12x12 sheet of cardstock, nine equal squares are traced and the corner blocks removed, then the remaining lines are scored (a fun little process of tracing the line with the plastic knifey thing guided by the grooves in the score board, and which I wondered briefly if I could have gotten the same effect with a popsicle stick and the crack in my table created by the drop leaf, but I quickly dismissed that thought when I saw how marvelously the tool and score board combination worked together).  The corners were rounded with a corner rounder tool.

Nine squares drawn lightly with a pencil.

Four corner blocks cut off.

Scored for easy and precise folding.

Repeat the above process two more times, using increasingly smaller dimensions each time.

Three boxes, three sizes.

  Corners rounded.

Then you make the lid, which was probably the easiest thing to do in the whole project and which I did wrong the first time and had to make a new one.

Measure twice, cut once. Glue
when you're damn sure you're right.

Left is right, right is wrong.

Fold the sides up, pop on the lid, and see? You've got yourself a box!

See? A box!

Embellishment time. I picked out some really pretty (I think) vintage-style paper for my box. I cut squares slightly smaller than the box side and rounded the corners (the directions gave exact measurements for cutting and made it really easy to follow). When these were glued onto each box side, the three boxes were nested together with the center squares glued together.

I love this paper.

IT'S SO PRETTY!

I embellished the top of the box, too, but chose to leave the sides plain.

The lid with embellishment.

Completed box.

I LURRRRRVE IT!

For the life of me, I couldn't figure out why this was called an exploding box. I guess because that's catchier than calling it a fall open box, which is really what it does, but call it what you want, it worked close enough for "X" and I call it A MAJOR PINTEREST WIN!

Here's a video of my husband's reaction:

I love my fall open box exploding box!