When the fucking fuck am I meant to wrap the presents

[Cryingatthegym]

Toddler DSs wake up at the arse crack of dawn (and sometimes through the night).

Tween DD still rattling around til nearly 11pm every night regardless of how early I send her up.

They're with me all day long. Single parent. Small house. Work full time. Am I meant to just wrap through the night or something? I'm shattered!

Aarrghhhh. Just needed a rant really. Feeling inwardly very unfestive towards poor DD right now as I listen to her traipse past my room to the toilet for the 50 millionth time tonight.

Gift bags for main presents?
Do you have to individually wrap everything else?

It's not faux concern to not use loads of sometimes non-recyclable paper.

That's what I was going to suggest.

Nobody's forcing anyone to use non-recyclable wrapping paper, which I agree is pretty dodgy but is a separate issue.

Actually loads of major UK retailers have switched to recyclable-only paper.

Lots of folk don't check if wrapping paper is recyclable, or even bother to recycle it if it is though.

The people who seem fanatical about wrapping everything also seem to be the ones who buy about 30 presents per child. Those of us who are more relaxed about not wrapping stocking presents or using a gift bag instead seem also to go less overboard on the actual presents too. Just have to see the posts on Christmas Day with the photos of huge piles of individually wrapped presents under the tree splashed over social media

I can't think of anything much more grinchy than just having a pile of stuff not wrapped or hidden in any way

Santa has never wrapped gifts here.

He leaves a stocking of 'bits' on the bed and then a sack of gifts, per child, in the living room (unwrapped but in a large, fluffy Christmas sack).

The dc wake Xmas morning, happily unpack their stocking then we creep down the stairs and they get the 'wow' and excitement of the three Santa sacks which have magically appeared in the living room, which they then unpack.

Wrapped gifts under the tree are from family. So after Santa, we sit and have a coffee and eat chocolate for a bit before sitting and unwrapping the tree gifts together - from Mum and Dad, Nanna, Auntie Sue etc.

It's bloody magical, not grinchy 😁 And it means we skip the stress entirely of wrapping all the Santa gifts, having special Santa paper to hide away or juggling and laying out lots of individual gifts on Christmas Eve.

On Christmas Eve, dh takes six tied black bags from our utility room. We take the black bags off, place three ready-packed sacks in the living room, three ready-packed stockings on dc's beds, stash the 3 x idential duplicate stockings from dc's bed in our wardrobe - and we go to bed. It takes us 10 minutes max and every year I'm more grateful we've done it this way!

And for anyone wanting to easily reduce stress Xmas Eve, buying duplicate stockings (a tip I read on here years ago) is I think, hands down, the best thing we've ever done!

Just a 10 second switch Xmas Eve rather than creeping in to collect the Stockings, packing them, putting them back etc.

Studio used to do some that looked like Christmas Puddings.

Judging by the rest of the society and the sales of wrapping paper, you're the outlier.

We're talking about presents being wrapped for your own children, not sent off to random people who might or might not recycle, so if you care about that sort of thing then the recycling is guaranteed.

If you don't then by definition you don't, and the paper will be burnt to create electricity (in our area).

It is faux concern if what you're wrapping is novelty gifts or one time/limited use plastic like stickers, lip balms, crap like that. If that's what's inside the wrapping then that's the problem, not the paper.

I figure you have to remove sellotape for the sheets to be recycled? That's the main barrier I think.

Tell tween to take toddler out in the buggy for an hour around the park tomorrow

Don't wrap stocking presents

Tell your daughter to wrap he little sisters presents then you only have the elder one's to do.

Not buying needless plastic sh**e should also be a priority.

This thread isn't just about your family.
Just look at any civic amenity site, especially after christmas, and you'll see lots of recyclables in standard waste.

This thread is about wrapping presents for your own children. Hence you have total control over the recycling or not.

🤣 ha are we in the 1950s now.

My point is that loads of folk have good intentions but then just end too tired/stressed and dump it all as normal waste.

You get tween to occupy toddler so you can get it done.

Mum told me a story of her having to go to the car lay the back seats down and wrap in there when we were all little.

I've just done them upstairs in the bedroom while everyone was otherwise occupied. My DC are older, admittedly, but they're still nosy toads at this time of year 😆

I was up till 2am last night - kids didn't got to bed till gone 11:30 (older kids ) and I've only go those to wrap for. Finished off today when they were both out