How to Make Your Own Gift Baskets

Gift baskets are beautiful, extravagant, and full of little treasures. They can be bought at a moderate to high price, or they can be made for pennies on the dollar. I will tell you how you can make a beautiful gift basket-CHEAP! Some supplies needed are baskets, skewers, tape, newspaper, paper filler (the color of your choice), basket wrap, spool of wire ribbon to match paper filler, and the basket items.

The most important item is the basket. Make sure that it is large enough to support all of the items that will be added. Baskets can be purchased at Goodwill, the local discount store, or local craft store. The baskets that work the best are the medium to large size wicker baskets with a handle.

Once the basket is purchased, the bottom of the basket needs to be filled with wadded newspapers. Use single newspaper pages and wad them to the size of a baseball or softball. Place them evenly along the bottom of the basket, with no gaps between each sheet of paper. Make sure that the paper wads aren't wadded too tightly. These wads are used as anchors, but they need to be loose enough to poke through. Leave about an inch gap from the top of the basket to the top of the newspaper.
When all the paper is in place, add the paper filler evenly on the top to cover all of the newspaper so that none of the newspaper is showing. Make sure that the filler isn't piled too high. This is a judgment call on how much filler is needed.

Here comes the tricky part, filling the basket. (Hint: After Christmas sales are the best time to get the items needed for pamper baskets. These items are drastically reduced and can be used through out the year and the following Christmas for any pamper basket that is made by you.) Starting with the largest item, take a skewer and cut it on the non-pointy end so that there is enough stick to cover half way up the basket item, and long enough to poke down to anchor through the newspaper. Take the cut skewer and tape it to the back of the item, securely, pointy side down. Depending on the tape being used, you may need to use more than one piece of tape. Once the skewer is taped securely to the item, poke it down through the paper in the spot where you want that item to be at. (Hint: Usually the larger items are in the middle part of the basket near the back.). Do this with all of the items: tape, poke, and secure. The back also has to be done. The key is to make sure that none of the skewers are showing.

Once all of the major items are in, fill in with some smaller items. Some small items, depending on what they are, won't need to be poked and secured. These items will simply need to be placed in strategic places.

Once the basket is full, and it looks the way you want it to, now is the time for the plastic basket wrap. The basket wrap will need to be placed on a flat surface, spread out, and even. Place the basket in the middle of the basket wrap. Then, with a great amount of care, grab the plastic and bring the two ends together up and over the basket. Gather the plastic in a plume at the top of the basket, and twist-tie securely. Tape the edges of the plastic wrap securely around the back in a discreet fashion. If you are using shrinkable plastic wrap, once all the plastic is secure, start at the bottom and use a blow dryer set on low, and "shrink" the plastic from bottom to top, avoiding the plastic plume at the top of the basket.

Once the plastic is tight around the basket, and everything seems to be secured, the last item will be added: the bow. If you are unsure how to make a bow, find someone that does, and make a beautiful full bow. (Hint: the fuller the bow, the prettier the package.) Place the bow on with a wire ribbon and secure where the plastic wrap is tied off at the bottom of the plume. One the ribbon is secure, take a piece of ribbon about two or three feet long, and tie around and underneath the bow to make the ribbon tails. The tails can then be clipped to size and design desired.

Congratulations, you have completed a genuine gift basket that anyone would be proud to receive as a gift. And no one needs to know how cheaply this extravagant gift was actually made for.