This past Christmas we decided to make up gifts for some of Munchkin’s teachers at garderie and for a few friends. I wanted to steer clear of mason jars as, honestly, I’m a little over them. I love them as vases etc, but they’re everywhere now. I decided to come up with something a little different.

I selected a recipe (Liberty London Girls fabulous gingerbread cookies – you can find my adapted GF version here) and I got to working out how to package it. Only problem was, this recipe required wet ingredients and a number of steps of different dry ingredients. Logically I probably should have found a different recipe. But I was determined.

 

 

So I found some cellophane bags and some little zip lock ones. Weighed out all the ingredients and packaged them up. This was the result. My husband thought it looked hilarious and advised it looked like I was giving out illicit drugs. And the mixed up spice mix looked hideous!

 

 

I’d picked up a few other bits and bobs to put into the gift bags. Jars of sugar pearls and some sweet little Christmas decorations. I decided to fill the Christmas ornament with little packets of sugar pearls and sprinkles, you can find the tutorial on how I put them together here.

 

 

But overall it still looked a bit boring. So I designed a wrapper and stickers to make it all a bit more cohesive. I’ve included the design for the wrappers and stickers in a PDF for you to download below. One is Christmas themed and the other has a little gingerbread man on the front – so easily used for any reason, not just the festive season!

So to make them up, you need:

• An A3 print of the pdf template on normal printer weight paper
• Some adhesive (I use double-sided tape, but you could easily use any form of paper glue)
• Optional: I printed the numbered stickers onto adhesive labels and cut them out, rather than use glue
• Two 18×30 cm cellophane bags
• One 75 x 90 mm zip log bag
• A jar that holds 100 ml (I purchased mine from the jam making section in my local grocery store)
• Oh and the ingredients for the cookies!

 

 

Weigh out your ingredients. Note: This recipe omits the lemon rind from the original.

For jar number one – weigh out:

• 1.5 tablespoons of treacle (33 grams)
• 3 tablespoons of golden syrup (63 grams
• 1 1/2 teaspoons of cinnamon
• 1 1/2 teaspoons of ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon of ground cloves
• 1 teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg

And don’t stir it up! It looks like delicious smelling mud if you do so. Put the spices on the top, and I suggest adding the treacle to the bottom (as it is heaviest and will settle on the bottom anyway I learned this the hard way)

 

 

In packet number two weigh out 115 grams of brown sugar into one of your 18x30cm cellophane bags and seal up with tape. I was unable to find brown sugar without resorting to mail order in Switzerland and so substituted raw sugar.

In packet number three put 3/4 of a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda into the small ziplock bag.

Into packet number four weigh out 335 grams of flour (use GF flour mix and add the guar gum to this packet if you’re making up the gluten-free version).

 

To make the packets, cut out the templates provided.

 

And lightly score along the faint dotted lines. This makes it much easier to fold the packet and to get a neat finish.

Roll and glue down the side seam marked on the template to create a paper ‘tube’.

 

Fold in the sides of the bottom as shown.

 

And on the under flap (the one without a logo) fold the top under about 1 centimeter. This makes it much easier to assemble.

 

Add double-sided tape or glue to the logo flap and stick down as shown above. You’ll need to put your hand into the packet to push down the two inside flaps created.

 

Then add the numbered stickers to your packets.

 

Place packets 2, 4 and four into the paper wrapper.

 

Fold the top of the bag at the light score marks and roll the top of the bag down, glueing it into place. And you’re done!

 

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