If you love junk journaling and you've been looking for a ready-made stash of handmade goodies to spark your next project, these vintage style Treasure Boxes from my Etsy shop are exactly that. Each box is packed with pieces I've made by hand — envelope journals, fabric envelopes, lace flowers, dyed tags, danglies, and more — plus a loose collection of ephemera, napkins, vellum, and book pages you can pull apart and use however you like. I only had eight available for this restock, and honestly, that's just the reality of making everything yourself.
What we cover
This is an unboxing-style walk-through of everything inside one of the Treasure Boxes — the handmade journal, all the loose embellishments, the ephemera packet, and the paper bag of goodies at the end. It gives you a clear picture of what you'd actually receive if you ordered one.
What you'll learn
What's inside the envelope journal — the centrepiece of the box is a handmade journal with four stuffed envelopes (two at the front, two at the back), 40 pages front and back, and light embellishment. It closes with a button-loop closure.
How the danglies work and where to use them — I love making these little decorative pieces, and I show exactly how they sit on a journal: hanging off the side of a spine at least a centimetre wide, or tucked along the edge. They add a lot of character for not much effort.
What the mini album is for — there's a small, unembellished album included so you can fill it your own way: photos, writing pages, whatever you want to put in there. I left it plain on purpose.
The lace flowers and how they're attached — these are handmade, and they sit on a card backing held down with double-sided tape so you can peel them off cleanly and use them directly in your journals or on a cover.
The layered crochet flower — four layers with a brad through the centre card. You just squeeze the brad and slide the flower off to use it on any project.
The flip-down notepad — a small folded-paper notepad tucked into the box. I include these because they add writing space and they look lovely tucked into a journal page.
The tag packet — several tea-dyed tags in different styles: one with sewing along the sides forming a little pocket, one with stitched fabric and a flower detail, one with gold ribbon. All have writing space and room to embellish further.
The ticket stubs and book pages — eight tea-dyed ticket stubs and around 12 pages from books in different languages (Croatian, Italian, Serbian, Dutch, and others). The book pages are great for backgrounds or pockets.
The photo album pocket insert — a piece from a photo album repurposed as a four-pocket insert, ready to use on a front page or inside spread.
The ephemera paper bag — the last item in each box is a bag of mixed goodies: napkins, black lace, vellum papers, pages from Flow magazine, die cuts, and bits and pieces. These vary between boxes, so every order is a little different.
Tips & gotchas
Because everything in the boxes is handmade, there will be slight differences between individual journals and kits — different embellishments, small variations in stitching or trim. That's part of what makes them handmade rather than mass-produced, but it's worth knowing if you're ordering more than one box and expecting them to match exactly.
The lace flowers and bows are attached to their card backings with double-sided tape. That's intentional — peel them off cleanly and they're ready to go straight onto a cover or page without any prep.
The paper bag of goodies at the end varies from box to box, so if you're ordering for a specific colour palette or style, the fixed items (the journal, the dangly, the tags, the lace flower) are the consistent part. The paper bag is more of a surprise.
If you want to see how the lace flowers or fabric envelopes are made, I have full tutorials for both linked in the description.
