How to Make Paper Bags With Pictures

Making paper bag crafts with your family and kids is an easy way to use your imagination and creativity on a dull afternoon. If you are making crafts for a festive holiday, such as St. Patrick's day or Easter, you can take these crafts and convert them into a personalized picture bag. By scanning in your images and using paper bag dimensions, you will be able to create a variety of photo paper bag projects.

Things You'll Need

• Scanner
• Pictures
• Paper bag
• Photo-editing software
• Printer
• 4 sheets of decorative or photo paper (your choice)
• Ruler
• Pencil
• Paper scissors
• Scoring tool (optional)
• Acid-free adhesive
• Brush applicator
• Pinking shears (optional)

Instructions

Creating the Picture Paper Bag

1. Scan your photo images, as well as your paper bag texture, into your photo-editing software. Open your photos and paper bag scans in your software's image-editing pad. Save each scan in a separate file.

2. Edit your photos by using applications, such as lighting, color cast or brightness adjustments. You can opt to add a decorative photo finish for aging photos. Save your changes in a separate file.

3. Position your photos in a blank area of your image-editing pad to create a paper bag template. Each software has different tools and applications. Check your software for overlapping and angling photos within the pad. Save your template.

4. Add the paper bag scan as an overall background insert to your template and save it again. You can opt to make different versions of your template. For example, use one template version for your bag and a second version for the bag's side panels.

5. Adjust your printer's resolution; the higher the resolution, the better quality will be your print out. Print four sheets of your template.

Making the Picture Paper Bag

1. Measure two printed sheets, 7 inches wide by 11 inches long with your ruler. Cut the two sheets out with your paper scissors. Fold over 2 inches at the bottom of each panel and lightly score. You can opt to use a scoring tool. Do not cut off the bottom 2 inches. This will form your paper bag's bottom panel in a later step.

2. Measure two printed sheets, 4 1/2 inches wide by 11 inches long, and cut out. Fold over 2 inches at the bottom of each panel and lightly score. These will be the side panels of your paper bag. The scored portion will be part of your paper bag's bottom panel.

3. Fold the side panels vertically in half. The photos will be on the inside of the fold. Crease the fold line and open.

4. Take the upper right corner and fold it towards the lower left corner. Crease the fold towards the center fold line. You will see a visible half triangle fold line. Repeat in the opposite direction by taking the upper left corner and folding it towards the lower right corner. Crease the fold towards the center fold line. You will have a triangle at the bottom of the side panels. This will collapse the paper bag.

5. Fold the sides of the front and back panels approximately 1/2 inch. These ends will overlap the side panels.

6. Fold the ends of the side panels approximately 1/2 inch. Apply a thin coating of acid-free adhesive on the folded ends with your brush applicator.

7. Overlap the front and back panel ends onto the adhesive applied to the side ends. Let dry. Your picture paper bag will begin to form.

8. Flip your paper bag over and fold in the side panels' scored bottoms. Apply a thin coating of the adhesive. Overlap the front and back panel's scored bottom over the adhesive. Let dry. You can opt to use pinking shears to cut a decorative edge for your picture paper bag

Tips & Warnings

• Make sure your decorative paper's specifications are for the type of printer you are working with. For example, choosing a vellum texture for your picture paper bag will oftentimes work with a laser or inkjet printer, while a linen texure will oftentimes only work with a digital printer.

• Open a pre-made lunch paper bag at the glued seams. Trace the paper bag panels for your pattern.

References

• "Paper Crafting with Carol Duvall: More Than 45 Projects from the Queen of Crafting!"; Carol Duvall; 2007

Resources

• LCI Paper: Specialty Paper