Presents too big to wrap

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What ways do you have (or remember from childhood) of presenting gifts like bikes, or other things which would use a lot of wrapping paper? Putting a sheet over them, bringing them out of another room with a flourish, taking the recipient to where it is all set up?

My parents simply used big plastic bags, and one big present was wrapped in newspaper and string. I remember a girl at school telling us how she received a bike: she was blindfolded while it was brought in, and told to have a feel, before it was revealed.

When we got bikes when we were younger my parents used to wrap up a brick in a box, it then had a note in it to go and check in the garage, where the bike would have a bow on it!

If the kids had enough other gifts - and with wider family, they always did - we did a bit of a reveal - either simply by hiding them in another room and asking them to go fetch something for example.
It was fun and added another element to the morning.
The year I could not get a PS5 - we gave them the actual cash via a mini guiz/games how set up. They loved it - and now I remember, it took until April 1st to get their hands on the console due to no stock in the country!

We always just had the big thing unwrapped and on display.

I've got my daughter a horse trailer for Christmas, so theres no way I can wrap it 😂
The plan is to get some car wedding ribbon and bows for it, then I need to 'pop out the car' Christmas morning. I plan on driving it in front of our house and tapping the horn.

If she doesnt sob with gratitude I'm done.

@Oreosareawful You could blindfold her, and take her inside the trailer, which could have some decorations up inside, before uncovering her eyes. See if she can work out where she is. If you want to be really elaborate, blindfold her and drive her a short distance in the car, arriving back at your house (without telling her), and take her inside the trailer to uncover her eyes; and when she steps out, she sees that she is unexpectedly outside her house. Getting carried away here!

I remember me and my sister having bikes as kids and them ‘appearing’ in the living room when we went back in after dinner.
We also had a Wendy house that wasn’t in the garden when we left to walk to my grandmothers house but was when we got back (took years to realise that when my dad ‘popped to help his friend’ he had actually gone home, met our neighbour and put the thing up).

And as a teen, we had a ‘teenage hangout’ in the garage for Christmas. Me and Dsis were sent out there to put rubbish in the bin or something and found sofas, a heater, a rug, cd player and posters on the walls.
If I remember correctly, we stole a coffee table from the house and ‘hosted’ Boxing Day in there

We’re not there with LO yet so even ‘big’ presents are from Santa and are therefore wrapped with paper with Santas face on (garage and toy kitchen so far, bike this year).

We have done festive treasure hunts - the large gift is the prize, hidden in the garage or the cellar with tinsel and ribbons.

Growing up there was no wrapping on anything. We just walked into a magic room full of toys like walking into santas workshop.

We added 'wrapping' for our own kids but only wrap a few things under the tree, everything else (and especially anything big) is out ready to see and play with which is way better.

Takes a while for us to set up on xmas eve night (with drinks, food, tv on) but it means no faffing in the morning. The kids can enjoy their gifts instantly without having to fight with packaging, find scissors, find screwdrivers, find batteries, build little fiddly bits all while they sit waiting and no disappointing surprises on the day if something doesn't work.

For anyone buying bikes and wondering how to wrap them, Halfords do a Christmas decorated bike bag for this very purpose. They also do other patterns for birthdays etc

I used to just put a Christmas blanket over a thing too big to wrap.

Once it's been pulled off the bike or whatever, you don't have any rubbish to get rid of as the blanket goes back on the sofa.

My grandmother asked my brother to draw the floor length curtains and ta-da- the bike was there!

Oh and once I had a huge hifi- it had sat in a box in the hall for weeks and my mum had told me it was my older brother’s stuff as he was moving flat! On the day she told me to look inside :)

@Oreosareawful if she doesn’t want it I will! This would literally be my dream gift!

My parents would send me on a mundane job to some random part of the house/garage/garden.

memorably:
took wrapping paper waste to the wheelie bin and found a trampoline

went to the garage to flip the trip switch on the Christmas lights (why was an 8 year old doing this?) and found a bike

went to the toilet at my grandparents and found a pair of Harry Potter trainers! I think they had just forgotten to wrap them. They were sitting on my stool for reaching the loo!

Batchelor uncle always used to come for christmas., arriving christmas eve.

One christmas eve at about 8 Oclock we were sent to bed, as dad & Uncle were going to the pub ( just never happened!) and if we were not good, Santa wouldnt come.

Unbeknown to us, they had trotted off down the garden, built and concreted in a massive climbing frame by torch light. Cant remember how we were sent to discover it Christmas morning

How they managed to bolt it all together by torch light is still beyond me

My families fave childhood story is the year they got me a bike, they put it in kitchen and had me go fetch things THREE times and i didnt even notice/react, just grabbed whatever i was fetching and left 😂

DH is king of the present treasure hunt, so much so that it has expanded over the years to normal sized gifts for xmas and birthdays and the ‘main egg’ at Easter! DC love it, DH has made a rod for his own back for at least the next 10 years 🤣🤣🤣

We use duvet covers - sometimes a gifted duvet, sometimes a double duvet in bright colours. I‘ll sometimes add a bow.

Wouldn’t work for climbing frames/ horse trailers and the like, though!

We had double doors that opened into the dining room. Parents waited until all presents had been opened and then revealed the bike by opening the doors in a kinda 'ooh What's that in there' kinda way

I'm so bloody excited, it's half my present too. She will be over the moon I'm sure as she has her first loan pony, and now we can take him to shows, pony club, cross country schooling etc

Halfords do huge decorative bags for “wrapping” bikes, which I’ve also used for a basketball stand and archery kit

This is more or less what we did.

I’m so surprised by all the answers on here, I thought it was just standard to have the big / main present on display under the tree, so it was the first thing the kids see as they come in the room. No need for any big reveal; opening the door was the big reveal.

I do wrap some Santa things, but always in plain brown paper, so that the kids don’t notice the wrapping paper is th same as the stuff I have or the same as the stuff in Aldi. And I also wrap a couple of things which are for me.

I can still remember when I was young, opening the living room door and seeing my new Cindy house all set up under the tree, or my new bike. It was amazing.

For some reason, as I got older, and didn’t get any big gifts anymore (late teen sort of age) my mum started wrapping every single little present. We didn’t have much money and she isn’t a good gift buyer so she would get me lots of pieces of tat and wrap them all individually. I just found it hugely tedious having to unwrap lots of individual items and feign excitement every time. For example she would buy me a 5 pack of socks and wrap each pair individually. A set of 5 make up brushes (that I wouldn’t use), all wrapped individually etc.

I see there are a variety of ways to reveal a big present: I like a bit of ceremony. My DH knows that I envied the girl who was blindfolded to receive her bike, so he blindfolds me before giving me a big or important present.

My favourite childhood Christmas memory is when there was a note under the tree from Santa. I had to go up to my room and knock 3 times on the door and open it. There was my bike. My 5year old self thought it was real magic since there was no bike in my room when I woke up!

I’m the fool that always wrapped everything. Bikes, massive slides, sandpits. You name it, I wrapped it. I’d draw the line at a horse trailer though. 😂