Creating with Eileen Hull's Sizzix Dies and Unexpected Supplies

 This month Eileen Hull has asked her Inspiration Team to make things using her dies with unexpected supplies.  After thinking about this for quite a while (!)  I decided to make a storage unit for some of the bits and bobs in my craft room using Eileen's Treasure Box Die and her Stacking Drawer Die. 

(I'll actually need about 100 of these for all the bits and bobs I have!)

My unexpected supplies?   A plastic/vinyl placemat for the box and drawer fronts and smooth river rocks for handles on the drawers!

The box measures 5 1/4" high x 3" wide x 2 1/4" deep 

(I trimmed down the depth of the box as shown further below)

View from the back.

I put some Idea-ology things in my drawers -  the wonderful plastic toadstools , metal stars and tiny wood slices.

Each drawer is 2 3/4" long  x 2" wide x 1 1/2" deep.

Here's how I made it.

These are the two dies used as well as the placemat.  Stacked Drawer and Treasure Box.

I die cut the box out of the placemat (not the cover) as well as the front panel of the drawer.  

I die cut the surround piece of the drawers out of matboard and the pieces for the drawers themselves out of watercolor paper.  The water color paper is stiff but not as thick as the matboard .  

I found that if I cut the drawers out of matboard, it was hard to pull the drawer in and out of the surround piece.

Below, the notched white pieces are the drawers and the small rectangles are the drawer bottoms.  The longer scored white pieces are the 'surround' of the drawers.  

I cut 3 of each piece for the drawers, two of the box sides and one bottom.

I folded the box pieces on all the score lines and put ScorTape on all the tabs. The score lines were scored perfectly on the plastic mat and it did not crack when I folded them.  

Then I assembled the box by attaching the shorter sides together at the tab.

and placed the bottom piece on the outside along the tabs that had ScorTape on them. 

This is how it looks on the inside.

This is how it looks on the outside.

So that finishes the box piece (accept for trimming down the depth shown later below)

Now onto the stacked drawers.  

I added ScorTape to one of the ends of the drawer surround that was cut from matboard and assembled three surrounds overlapping the two ends.

I put ScorTape on both of the long sides of the middle piece to adhere the 3 surround pieces on top of each other being careful to line them up as evenly as possible.

I put a strong adhesive glue (Beacon 3 in 1) on the bottom of the stack and on the sides (not on the top!)

and placed the stack inside the box all the way to the back of the box.  

The box is deeper than the surrounds so I first cut the corners to about 1/4"above the surrounds and then cut across each side until the box was just slightly past the surround. The plastic is stiff, so it's easier to cut across each edge a little at a time until you are down to about 1/4" past the surrounds.  

I used my sturdy Tonic scissors to cut through the plastic cleanly.

I put clothespins along the glued sides to hold them until the glue had time to set (an hour or so).

While the glue was drying,  I assembled the 3 drawers that I had die cut out of watercolor paper.  I put ScorTape on all the tabs, adhered the smaller side tab to the other end of the drawer piece and then placed the bottom piece over the bottom tabs from the outside of the drawer 

(just like when assembling the box)

I adhered the front panels I had cut out of the plastic place mat on the fronts of the drawers using Ultra Bond Adhesive.

I used the strong glue again to glue the polished stones to the front of the drawers and let them sit overnight to be sure they were dry as they would be pulled to open the drawers.  

I chose stones that had a flat surface on one side to adhere to the drawer and also large enough to pull with my fingers to open the drawer!

There is a little space at the top of the drawers as the box is a tad taller than the 3 stacked drawers, that's why I didn't glue the top of the drawers to the box.  

Using the colorful plastic/vinyl placemat gives the box a pretty design, is light weight but strong and waterproof, so it makes for a great case for my little storage drawers and the stone drawer pulls give it a little 'character'!  

(even though you COULD open the drawers just by putting  your finger in the cut out on the drawer front)

What kind of unexpected supplies do you have around your craft room that you might create with??!

Please stop by Eileen Hull's Blog every Wednesday during the month of May to be inspired by her Inspiration Team creating with unexpected supplies!

Paper: Little Sizzles Matboard - Sizzix, water color paper - Canson Cold Press

Accessories: Treasure Box Die, Stacking Drawer Die - Eileen Hull/Sizzix, plastic/vinyl place mat - The Dollar Store, polished stones - JoAnn, Scortape, Beacon 3 in 1 Advanced Craft Glue, Ultra Bond Adhesive - iCraft, Tonic Scissors, Toadstools, Wood Slices,  Adornments: Metal Stars - Tim Holtz/Idea-ology.