My First DIY: Gifts For My Boyfriends 22nd Birthday.

So it was my boyfriends 22nd birthday on the 9th of June, and as a student I didn't have much money to spend. I decided on creating a few different DIY gifts for him, as well as a couple of shop brought gifts. I am going to show you the things that I made and give a brief description on how to make them. And if any of you want more detailed instructions with photographs, let me know and I will create a more in-depth post :)

The gifts that I made are;
• Sharpie mugs.
• 7 days of love.
• Sweet jar.
• Book of love coupons.
• Letter-cut photograph.
• Birthday cards.
• Gift wrapping.

And the gifts that i brought were;
• Build your own rubber band car.
• Macro lens for iPhone.

He loved all the gifts that I made and that I brought. I'll now show you photographs of the gifts and brief descriptions on how i made them :)

Sharpie mug:

This was a massive trend not so long ago, and after reading so many different reviews saying that it worked and it didn't work, I decided to just go ahead and try it. As my boyfriends name is Henry, i decided to use the letter 'H' on one of the mugs. And the saying 'Good Morning, Handsome' on the other mug. I added a little red heart with the saying but baking it turned it yellow, which I actually quite like. I used a regular black sharpie and baked it in the oven at 340 for about 20-30 minutes, I let the mugs heat up with the oven and cool down with it after the time. I haven't washed them yet, but I know it won't be in the dishwasher. Once they've been used a few times I'll let you know how well it worked., or wether using paint pens would be the best option.

7 Days of love

I saw this really cute idea on pintrest and a few other blogs and I immediately fell in love with the idea. Basically i went down to Wilkinsons (a pound-shop would probably have them), and brought a seven day pill box. I also brought a variety of sweets including; M&Ms, Smarties, Skittles, Love Hearts and Sunkists. I then cut 7 pieces of thin paper and wrote a little love note on each and put one in each day, along with some of the sweets. Now everyday for a week after his birthday he gets some sweets and a little love note. And who knows, sometimes I may be kind enough to refill it with sweets :)

Sweet jar

With all the left over sweets that I brought I didn't want to leave them out (although i could have eaten them all myself) I decided on making another little sweetie present. This one was really simple, I brought a small Kilner jar from Wilkinsons and drew around the lid on some paper and cut it out, on the top I wrote 'Your Sweet Like Sugar' (and yes, I've just noticed my grammar in this haha) and put all of the left over sweets in the jar. That simple :)

Book of love coupons

This was the most time consuming present that I made. All i needed was paper, scissors, a pen and a split key ring (the loop that holds key rings). To make this i cut up loads of pieces of smallish paper rectangles and cut out a half circle on one end of it. I then wrote all of the coupons and the front page, put some holes through them and linked them together with a split keyring. I really liked making these, and my boyfriend loved this present. Instead of wrapping this present I put it into a card and envelope. The card simply had 'LOVE' on the front and inside I wrote the rules of the coupons and the expire date.

Letter-cut photograph

This was the most difficult present to make, and it didn't quite work out how I imagined it would look, still my boyfriend liked it and thats the whole point, right :). For this i printed out an A4 size of a photograph of my boyfriend riding his beloved motocross bike and brought a glass clip frame. I then drew out the quote 'Live Life Full Throttle' from the photograph in thick capitals. Cut them out and stuck them in onto white paper, and clipped them into the glass frame. I think if I was to do this again I would print the photo onto a canvas and stick down the letter and pray white paint over it for a more interesting look to it.

Cards

To add to the whole DIY feel to his birthday presents i decided to create my own cards. One was for the coupon book, one was for a scratch card that I brought him (which unfortunately he didn't win on) and the last was his actual birthday card. As we both love Breaking Bad and we have just finished watching all the series' I thought only right to make and give him this card.

Gift Wrapping

Again, with the gift wrapping i didn't want to just buy ordinary wrapping paper. I wanted to create something a bit special. So after looking for a lovely way to wrap on Pintrest I found one similar to this.  I brought brown packaging paper, and an old book from a charity shop. I wrap them normally in the brown paper, and then from the old book I cut out the letter from his name and stuck them onto the wrapping. This took an extremely long time, but I think that it was worth it as it looks wonderful. 

Shop brought presents

I also decided to buy him a couple shop brought presents. Only little things that he can play with and mess about with. I brought a Guinness World Record Build Your Own Rubber Band Cars and a Macro lens that he can put to work with his iPhone.

I had a lot of fun making these gifts for my boyfriends 22nd birthday. What gifts have you ever made your friends and families?  I hope you enjoyed this post :)