Beautiful Autumn Gift Basket
Autumn is such an incredible time for weddings, and along with weddings come bridal showers! There are so many bridal shower gift ideas that step outside the box of normal gifts. One of those ideas is giving the bride-to-be a gift basket. Today, I’m going to show you this autumn gift basket I made. I know you’ll love it and I hope it inspires you and gets your creative juices flowing!
Weddings, bridal showers, events, oh my!
I met my friend Amanda while working part-time at a tutoring center back in 2016. We’ve been friends ever since! We’ve been through a lot and have supported each other throughout those years, and she actually moved to my hometown last summer. It’s been so nice having her around 😊 Amanda and I were both teachers and she still is a teacher while I’m not. She teaches middle school math and is amazing for it.
Amanda has a laidback personality and was originally going to have a very laidback wedding. We laughed about that the last time we talked because that completely changed once she booked her venue. She’s having her wedding at Cameron Estate Inn in Mount Joy, PA. Guys, it looks straight out of a fairytale! Since then, Amanda has embraced the atmosphere of the venue. Even so, she’s still incredibly laidback and appreciates simple things, just like I do!
Her main color is navy and the main element is sunflowers. She’ll also have autumnal elements and pops of colors throughout the wedding. All of this information was perfect for inspiring me to create her gift.
Why a gift basket?
Amanda and her fiancé, Aaron, already live together and they have a lot of things, so they didn’t create a registry with a lot of items. Honestly, I barely looked at her registry. One thing she did tell me she wanted was a sunflower spoon rest but she couldn’t find what she was looking for – more on that later 😉
With all this in mind, I knew I wanted to create a gift for her that was a little more unique than just buying something off her registry and putting it in a bag. For a few years now, I’ve really enjoyed creating gift baskets or bags and giving them away as gifts. Honestly, they make such great gifts because you can get as creative or ornate as you want to. However, you can also keep them simple and tailor them to the gift receiver’s personal tastes. And that is exactly what I wanted to do for my beautiful friend. Best of all, they allow me to utilize my creative abilities and put them to good use.
Another reason I love gift baskets is because they are so incredibly versatile and don’t cost much more than a gift. You can use boxes, baskets, crates, tubs, and even bowls as the base! The fun part is filling them with lots of personalized goodies.
Gift basket elements
The Base:
With every gift basket you start with…well, the basket! But it doesn’t have to be a basket, per se. As I mentioned above, you can use many items as your base: Boxes, baskets, crates, tubs, bowls, and many more.
The Filler:
After you choose your base, you need some kind of filler. The filler helps to stabilize and hold your items in place while also giving them a lift so the gift basket has a more appealing presentation. Typically, they are filled with crinkle or shredded paper. It’s cheap and works really nice in a basket. Towels may also work well.
The Items:
This is my favorite part because you can customize the items to any taste! Some ideas for gift basket item themes include:
- Kitchen
- Spa day
- Movie night
- Mom-to-be
- Cooking date night
- Garden
- Ice cream sundae
- Game night bundle
- Wine and chocolate
- Coffee lovers
Seriously, the ideas are endless! I absolutely love deciding on the theme of the basket and picking out items that I think will go with the theme. I recommend doing some research before you gather all the items. Depending on the size of your base, you have to be cognizant of the items you’re buying. You don’t want to run the risk of buying a basket that’s too small to fit all of your items. On the other end, you want to make sure you have a balanced number of items to fill the basket. However, this is where the decorative elements can help.
Decorative elements:
If you have a basket with a lot of little items or trinkets, adding decorative elements can help give your basket the face lift it needs. The easiest idea for decorative elements is to grab some fake flowers or foliage from your local craft store. It adds just a little extra oomph and makes it look even cuter!
Wrapping it all up:
Why yes, pun intended! 😉 More than likely, you’ll be wrapping up this gift basket. Wrapping it just helps everything come together. And it also helps to make sure no stray items escape! In order to wrap up your basket beautifully, here are the items you’ll most likely use:
- Shrink wrap or cellophane. They sell this in rolls at craft stores and it’s usually less than $5 per roll. This is what you’ll use to actually wrap up your gift basket.
- String, twine, or ribbon. Once you have your basket wrapped, you’ll want to tie it up. Even if you buy a bow with the little twisty thing attach, once you have your cellophane bunched up, it’s pretty thick and the twisty won’t be big enough to tie around the cellophane.
- Bow or ribbon. If you’re super crafty, feel free to make your own bow. I love DIY but not that much! I usually buy a pre-made bow from the craft store and attach it to whatever I tied around the cellophane. Whatever you use, it adds a really nice final touch. Even if you choose not to wrap up your basket, you can still add a bow to it.
Gift basket item links
Ok, my favorite part! Now, I get to tell you everything I put in my basket and where you can get these items as well. I procured the items from Hobby Lobby, Etsy, Amazon, and Bath & Body Works.
Items from Hobby Lobby:
- Crate (Approx. $17) – Even though this is a set, I just bought one crate that looks very similar to this style, I believe the middle or largest size.
- Crinkle paper (Gray) ($2.99 X 3 = $8.97) – I bought three bags of the crinkle paper and use all of it! I actually kind of measured it before buying it by placing the bags of paper in the crate to see how much I would need, and that tactic worked out really well.
- Sunflower stems ($1.79 X 3 = $5.37)– I bought three stems, but only ended up using two of them because of how they fit in the basket. The good thing is they’re only about $2.00 per piece!
- Decorative pumpkin ($3.59)– I don’t think this is the exact pumpkin I bought, but it’s pretty darn close. It added such a cute aesthetic to the basket and really went with the autumn theme!
- Pumpkin and Berries Pick ($4.19)– This was my favorite decorative element. Even though Amanda’s colors are navy and sunflower yellow, the light blue added such a nice pop and rounded out all of the decorative elements in the basket.
- Sweater Weather mug ($6.59) – I liked this mug so much that I bought one for myself 😊 As a girl who loves coffee, I knew adding to my friend’s mug collection was a must.
- Shrink wrap roll ($5.99)– It added such a nice touch
- Wrapping paper – I couldn’t find the exact wrapping paper I bought, but it was blue with gold dotes/speckles/circles. It went perfectly with Amanda’s colors!
- Burlap bow ($3.49) – After wrapping the gift basket in shrink wrap, the burlap bow was such a nice, final touch.
Items from Amazon:
- The Gilmore Girls Official Cookbook ($18.89) – Amanda and I both love Gilmore Girls. We’ve bonded over this fact! She’s been wanting more recipes, so I thought that giving her this cookbook would be a great idea, and she loved it!
Items from Etsy:
- Vintage sunflower spoon rest ($25.92) – There’s a fun story behind this spoon rest. Because it’s vintage, there aren’t anymore, but I linked the Etsy store where I bought it from. Amanda and I were talking about her registry items. She wanted a sunflower spoon rest but couldn’t find one that she liked and added a random one to her registry. She also said she wanted one without a handle. I took it upon myself to find one that she likes. Thank you, Etsy! I found this adorable vintage spoon rest that fit the description she was looking for perfectly.
Items from Bath & Body Works:
I bought both of these with a gift card because they were parts of deals and I thought they’d be a great addition to Amanda’s bridal shower gift basket! They’re both cozy scents that you can’t go wrong with.
Final Thoughts
I had SO much fun making this gift basket! The wonderful thing about gift baskets is there is an endless supply of creative ideas you can put into making them happen. All you need is a base, some fun items, and a few elements to make it look pretty. Instead of just grabbing a gift that anyone else can, next time you need to give someone a gift, consider putting your creative juices to the test and make a gift basket. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised at what you can come up with!
