Origami Seed Packets
There are lots of ways to store your seeds. “In a dry, cool, dark space” pretty much sums it up. But if you collect your own, what do you put them in? Glass jars? Plastic baggies? Paper envelopes? I don’t have enough space for glass jars and I try to avoid plastic (and I find seeds sometimes sweat inside). I like paper envelopes but even better than that is recycled paper envelopes. Make the most of your waste paper and junk mail and fold up these nifty origami packets. No glue or scissors required! It’s even therapeutic once you get the hang of it. Plus if you use old magazine pages they can be quite pretty! I store all of my packets in a big airtight box with a couple of silica/desiccant packets.
Instructions:
Grab a piece of paper or tear out a page of a magazine. Any size is fine but I like something around A4.
Fold up one corner
Fold down the excess rectangle so you can tear it off (we want a square in the end).
Make your fold line super crisp to help tear easily
If you start your tear from the side away from the diagonal fold it’ll be much easier.
You can discard the rectangle.
This is the trickiest bit. Eyeball a third of the way across the folded part, fold the corner across. (The original diagonal fold is on the left in this photo.)
(Close enough is good enough!)
Repeat on the other side.
In theory you should have it folded neatly in thirds. In reality, either guess your thirds again (you can see on the right hand side I have two fold lines because I was way off), or just flatten it hard in the next step and make it work!
Tuck one into the other.
Doesn’t matter which one.
Flatten it out.
This is where if your thirds weren’t perfect you just press it flat and it’ll sort itself out. Or I have been known to fold the tip of the inside corner over to make it fit…
Fold up the bottom.
Fold down the top flap.
If you open up the last two steps (the top flap and the bottom), you can separate the top flap and you should have a little pocket to put your seeds in.
Then fold it back up and tuck that top triangle flap into the gap.
Label it and you’re good to go! I like to put the seed type and the date I collected/bought them, but you add all sorts of data. Use a sharpie to help distinguish your writing from the magazine.