Christmas Wrapping Thread

[DreamloverTealover]

This year I really want to try using brown paper and using string or ribbons to make it nice. Maybe a festive thing on the front. Been on Pinterest and there's so many lovely things!

Wondered if people would like to share previous really nice but simple wrapping? 🎅

You can buy biodegradable tape now with festive designs on. I’ve done brown paper. Pinterest is definitely your friend here, my green has an exceptional talent for wrapping, she has a million grandchildren to buy for so it’s not surprising. But seriously her paper folding skills are insane! I’m not even sure how she does some it!! Round presents have almost like a fan fold on the top and bottom

just remembered one year I added an amaretto biscuit, the traditional paper wrapped one, to all the parcels for grown ups next to the name tags and that looked so nice and everyone thought it was novel. And I’ve done same with Candy canes and gold coins but chocolate is always a bit risky in case people put them near a radiator

Love the Amaretto biscuit idea I would love that.
I've used chocolate tree decorations -the ones with the loop/tie- on the DC presents , but obviously you need to be careful if you have dogs .

Fabric squares would be a really good alternative to paper , it would be worth searching out fabric end-of-rolls

curious are these just glue dots or something different (like a double sided tape?).

@mam0918 they are basically just circles of sellotape on a roll that you peel off like stickers! I prefer them because you use far less than you would use in strips of tape IYSWIM.

Has anyone had some nice wrapping ideas recently?

I have managed to make some boxes look good with kraft paper and string!

I've opted for dark green Kraft paper this year. I'm going to get some twine and maybe some ivy leaves to decorate or maybe some of these

I'm sticking with brown paper and brown paper tape again. And I just write names on the presents once wrapped so there's last waste/less to recycle. The brown paper goes in our compost bin quite happily if there's no sellotape on it

Seasalt jute bags (that I buy in the sales after Christmas). Other family do similar so we return reusable bags for the next year.

For presents that are given more distantly (teachers, friends children etc) I get some nicely designed recycled or recyclable paper. Primark did some lovely ones last year that were nice to wrap with - sometimes brown paper is too thin and holes are easily poked in but this was robust enough to use. The rolls were really long too. Sometimes Kraft paper is massively overpriced!

Oh, Tesco do Kraft bottle and gift bags year round that look super with a sheet of Christmas tissue paper in. M&S is a good shout for decent tissue paper but not seen anything nice there this year. Has anyone tried Rex London? This looks sweet www.rexlondon.com/winter-walk-tissue-paper-10-sheets

Tend to stick to red and gold traditional look. Did the double ribbon a la Cox and Cox one year but really wasn't worth the effort. This year have gone for a complete mix of colourful papers which I have no idea what will look like (different colour paper for each of 8 adults/DC as I raided paperchase sale last Jan) but these are previous...

@Shwighty1 love the biscuit and candy cane idea!

@RemusLupinsBiggestGroupie the green Kraft paper sounds really good I'll make a note of that for next year!

@Rainsdropskeepfalling im off to look for brown paper tape now.

@Brogues Rex London is brilliant though I've mainly bought gifts not craft stuff. Also know what you mean about Kraft paper being more expensive probably because it's popular. Recyclable wrapping paper is good.

@TwinsAndTiramisu red and gold is my Christmas tree theme so really keen on your colour scheme gifts!

I can’t find any pretty paper this year. I know it’s all plastic free and recyclable etc. we burn it on the fire anyway so makes no difference.

I’ve started wrapping with my Kraft paper with green designs. It looks and feels so joyless. Like some sort of Dickensian paupers Christmas. Looks and feels like a paper bag you’d get veg in.

There must be something jolly out there.

WHSmith do nice wrapping paper. Lots of shops are doing plain thin paper wrapping due to recycling…..they’re all horrible. I never have a theme. I like to wrap peoples presents in a different paper

@Trumpton
@TwinsAndTiramisu

Gorgeous wrapping, both of you! Lovely ideas thank you.

On a mission to have beautiful wrapping again this year. Usually I knock it out of the park.

Last year was my biggest Christmas fuck to date. I left all wrapping until Christmas Eve. Kids didn’t sleep for ages and of course I hadn’t built any toys yet, either. Partner helped for a bit but he was up early in the morning to sort the turkey (that’s our agreement- I do the wrapping and making stuff look pretty, he sorts the food). He’s shit at wrapping (and toy building as well tbf), I’m shit at cooking. It tends to work.

Oh, wasn’t I still up at 5am wrapping presents and building toys? Eyes were falling out of my head and even though our kids are small so it didn’t actually matter if the presents were wrapped or not, the elite wrapping fairy in me refused to quit.

Worst Christmas morning ever. All I wanted to do was crawl back to bed.

So, this year I’ll be wrapping and building toys long before Christmas Eve. At least this way it gives me time to make things look nice which makes me happy, and I’ll be able to actually enjoy Christmas Eve/Day.

Anyway, spiel aside. I really like the combination of printed brown paper wrapping and then festive coloured ribbon or twine. I like a traditional colour palette although I do like to get a few rolls of patterned paper to print it up a bit. I’d really like to get a tartan roll this year and maybe some matte dark green to add some contrast. If I have enough time I’d like to add some twigs of holly to the wrapping as well. Obviously for the kids I just do regular paper so it’s easy for them to open/safe, but I really enjoy doing the adults’ presents to a potentially OTT level 😅

I did this one year - brown paper and snowflakes with a little calligraphy 😊

I've tried stamping brown paper as well and, though I had lovely big stamps and red, green and gold ink, I thought they looked a bit bland. I also learned that stamping enough paper for one present is fun, but doing the metres of paper needed for Christmas felt like factory work.

To be honest I think a pile of presents looks best when they're in lots of different papers - as long as the paper is all reasonably tasteful and Christmassy. I usually rely on the multipacks of flat wrap for this effect, but this year is going to be even more varied because I'm aiming to use up all of the old paper before buying any more.

One year I wrote the lyrics to Christmas songs all over brown paper and then finished with red ribbons. It looked nice, but was a bit of a stupid use of my time!

I’ve just dug out a fairly simple one I did one year too it worked quite well I thought! You just cut thin strips of a complementary coloured paper or paper ribbons. I’m still completely uninspired for this year!!

OMG you just reminded me of my worst wrapping fail! I decided to use brown paper and twine which I bought from a florist. I spent a fortune on a Christmas stamp and ink pad.

First, I did not have enough arms to hold down the paper while I wrapped it up, the paper kept undoing before I got the knot sorted! Took hours and looked a mess.

Then I realised how hard it was to stamp trees on large sheets of paper so decided to wrap things first then just stamp once on the front. This was not too bad on boxed gifts but a big fail on squishy parcels as there was no hard surface to stamp on.

Then, when all the gifts were opened, even though I said the brown paper should be kept separate for recycling, my BIL just gathered everything up into large plastic bags to take to the tip.

At that point I gave up and got drunk!

This year I’ve got dark green recycled paper and loads of different coloured ribbons/string. Do it every year and recycle the ribbon at least, if not the paper too. Looks Xmassy and can also be reused if reversed (brown) or different colour ribbon. Also have a couple of boxes that are tied up with garden string and look nice 😊

I have dark matte green 🙂. Sainsburys 6m for £3 and was 3for2. 100% recycled, quite thick. Won’t need any more with what I had left.

Wrapping paper seems to have regressed this year. WH Smith’s had metallics, glitter, terrible stuff. Sparks and Waitrose were uninspiring. Oxfam has some nicer designs on kraftpaper but I think left over from last year ( which were lovely)

Brown paper with sticky silver and gold stars (from pound shop)