Origami Envelopes: In Rainbows

After almost 5 months in the works, here are the wedding thank-you notes in their final form – signed, sealed and now in the hands of the Postal Service:

Since I can’t seem to manage to do anything simply (or in a timely fashion for that matter *ahem*), I decided I would make the thank-you notes from scratch, including envelopes, much like we did with our party invites.

When we sent our invitations out last autumn we also included an origami paper crane in each envelope:

to tie-in with the origami boxes we made to hold our favors:

As a means to bring this whole endeavor full-circle, now that the party is over, I also used origami paper to create the envelopes for the thank-you notes.

And it was pretty simple to do!

Watch… I’ll show you.

First, you’ll want to select a large (9 3/4″) square piece of paper (color side down):

Next, fold your paper into a triangle:

Take the top layer of the triangle and fold down to meet the center of the base:

Fold the right corner approximately 1/3 over to the left (it’s really hard to make them perfectly uniform so this part is somewhat inexact):

Then do the same with the left corner:

Fold the corner of your last fold (left flap) back onto itself so its edge continues the straight line made from the top right edge of the envelope:

Here’s where it gets a little tricky…

Now, take the point of the flap you just made and fold it toward the top corner of the flap:

Unfold this last fold, exposing the crease, as it is there to guide you through the next step:

Open the creased fold so it looks hollow inside and then “squash” the folds until you have a “sideways” square:

Fold the top point of the envelope down so that it meets about 3/4 of the way down your “sideways” square:

Then tuck that point into the sideways square; flatten the envelope by pressing gently on all the creased areas and PRESTO! – origami envelope:

I found that I needed to add some strategically placed tape around the bottom as well as over the tucked square in order to secure the envelope for USPS transit but if you just plan on using these for hand delivery or table cards or WHATEVER else, then your origami envelope is good to go!