Anyone used decorated parcel paper as wrapping paper?

[GreatBritishWankOff]

I've been looking become addicted to at Pinterest crafting ideas.

I'm thinking of using parcel paper instead of wrapping paper this year. I was thinking of decorating it with stamps of stars, trees and other Christmassy bollocks.

What kind of paint would I need? Would acrylic paint like this be okay?

Or would I be better off with ink like this?

It's only an experiment this year so I don't want to spend too much money

I used plain brown parcel paper last year, with brown paper luggage tags and wrapped with red and white string. It sounds plain, but piles of these presents under the tree looked really lovely. Plus the paper is really strong and is recyclable. I'll definitely be doing the same this year.

I've done this. You could use either of those. I prefer the paint because you can replenish it rather than the ink pads which inevitably run dry. I quite often just use plain parcel paper and tie nice ribbons and use a pretty tag on the gift. But I've become very lazy over Christmas in recent years.

I did this one year with plain parcel paper and neon ribbon and elaborate bows. Looked super under the tree!

That's good to know, Foof.

2ducks, that's the kind of look I was hoping for and I really like that it's all recyclable.

Ooooh, I hadn't thought about neon ribbon

I use brown parcel paper every year, and tie with white string with holly/ivy/mistletoe tied into the bows. I also stick gold and silver chocolate coins on with double-sided tape.

I have also used both plain and decorated.

The children stamped up the decorated one using paints and the gifts were for Grandparents.

The plain one looks lovely with white ribbon sometimes with an accent colour. I don't "wrap" the present with ribbon, I wrap the front and then at the back I cut it and tape it so that it is really easy to open the gift if you are using the thin curling ribbon.

Ooooh, I like the idea of sticking chocolate coins on

And putting some holly into the bows. Do you have to dry this out?

Anyone got any pictures of their creations? You all sound impressively crafty and arty!!

Me again!

Where do you all get your parcel paper from? Where's cheapest? I'm guessing Amazon?

Also, I'm going to use paint but does it need to be a particular kind of paint - I've got chalk paint, emulsion and metal paint in the shed - will that do?

In the range they have rolls of brown paper 16m x 50 cm for £1. I bought a tiny Christmas tree stamp and a black ink pad also for £1. It’s great for square/straight edge presents but on soft things (eg DD’s dressing gown) it was too thick and looked quite messy (will need practice I think!)

Yep, I've told DP we can only buy people things that come in square boxes this year because of my wrapping experiments

I’ve used parcel paper for wrapping, didn’t decorate the paper but used nice ribbon, red velvet, tartan grosgrain etc. I also attach little gold bells or small pine cones to the ribbon,, looks pretty without much effort