To think wrapping paper is a waste of money?

[Soubriquet]

Every year I wrap all the presents and I think “this is just going straight in the bin. May as well chuck the money in the bin”

Yet, every year I still stupidly spend hours wrapping gifts.

I have about 6 or 7 people where we all use gorgeous paper and real ribbon. I have totally adopted zero tape wrapping now so the paper gets 5+ uses before recycling. I find it a real joy.

We have stockings and sacks and do no gift wrapping at all for people living in this house. Among family we reuse gift bags until they are not fit for purpose, I do the same with my friends. We use hardly any wrapping paper at all and I like that.

I switched to fabric wrappings a few years ago and it works really well.

I have a range of material bags mostly made from old children's clothes like a sequinned skirt, satin dressing gown etc and then lots of scarves from charity shops.

We've got used to it now so everything goes in a bag/wrap and then as we open the presents all the wrappings go straight back in the container for next time.

It's taken a few years to build up enough for Christmas but I wouldn't go back to paper now.

I use the same thing for birthdays but only for people outside the household if we know them really well as I want my fabric back!

No, you need to have some kind of nice wrapping for a gift. However, I increasingly favour gift bags. Maybe a bit of nice tissue paper. I use them over and over again!

Brown paper on a roll and gardening string.

If I receive a present with ribbons, I save them and re-use.

In order to cut down on waste, we have stopped using wrapping paper for family presents.

A couple of years ago I bought some Christmassy fabric and persuaded my daughter (who is much better than I am with a sewing machine) to make several bags of various sizes.

We now use those and obviously re-use them.
An unintended benefit is that it is a lot easier to deal with awkward shaped presents.

I have't used wrapping paper for a good few Christmases now. I use brown paper from boxed deliveries, gift bags that have been given to me and newspaper. I have bright paint pens to write on the newspaper or brown paper and nice velvet or satin ribbon that gets recycled. I've also got some fabric gift bags and some stockings.
Dh loves buying expensive gift wrapping paper and thinks I'm miserly. The rest of the family do the same as me, including adult children and SiL. My war-baby Mum is delighted we all save the ribbons, it satisfies something in her! We reuse cards to make labels, and use leaves and found objects to decorate.

Brown paper here, saved from deliveries if possible. Each person has different coloured string or wool.

The paper is torn up and layered into the compost heap over the following couple of weeks.

My mum made loads of beautiful cloth gift bags from fabric remnants. They now recycle around family and friends. I would never buy gift wrap.

I got these gift bags last year that you put a present in and pull and tie together - I saved all the ones from the kids gifts to reuse this year. Made it so much easier

I wrap all my gifts with the Amazon brown paper that comes in their boxes and string. Sometimes ink stamp with stars to jazz it up.

Fabric wraps for family. Gift bag for others.

Not environmentally friendly but I love the episode in Gavin and Stacey when Smithy wraps all his presents up in tinfoil , 30 seconds job done😂 Having spent too many years trying to get neat edges, the idea of wrapping everything up like a pasty seems very appealing.

We use and reuse pieces of material.

When we were children in the 70s, we had to open presents carefully, the wrapping paper was then ironed, folded and put away for next year. 🤣 Recycling was the norm.

For under twos I often think that the gift is more of a waste of money. They seem to get a great deal of pleasure from the wrapping alone.

We use gift bags and seal them with Christmas clothes pegs so they can be reused (no tape)

Gift bags and Christmas clothes pegs is a brilliant idea. I’m going to do that from now on.

I use newspaper.

I’ve done this too and use them each year for family presents.

I also save any brown paper from deliveries and get the DC to colour on them, then use those for presents which are going further away.

We use a combination of gift bags and boxes plus the Xmas themed bags for life eg from tkmaxx
everyone keeps them and reuses them the next year - depending on size of gift you may even get your own packaging bag
I still paper wrap a few thing such as work secret Santa

Love gift wrap and always use it. I recycle it. For some people who like the style I use brown paper and ribbons

I have been thinking about using the paper from Who Give A Crap toilet rolls, bonus is they have nice patterns.

Here

Fabric gift bags last year saved me hours of wrapping! It took me half an hour to put things in the bags rather than a couple of evenings getting slowly grumpier. They are really easy to make too.

DD would prefer paper and we do use it for stocking presents but we use brown wrapping paper and reuse it.

We have a 'collection' of gift bags which we re-use every year and no waste. They fold flat and go into a plastic box next to the decorations 7ntil the next year.