One of the things that I love to do around the holidays is to pick out gift wrapping paper and pretty ribbons-- although wrapping, Ill admit, has never been my forte’! This is a task, that I easily assign to my hubby, not that I’m being mean and trying to give him extra work but he can tie a ribbon better then me--I believe this is a talent he acquired from his mother. However, I still love to shop for gift-wrap and all the trimmings!
Over the years, I’ve found I would often spend more on wrapping paper, ribbons, and tags then on the gifts --sometimes I would even buy my paper before all of my gifts (like this year). Currently storage is a huge issue at my house, so I don’t want to spend a lot of money on gift wrapping paper because when Xmas is over and the paper that is left over will be going in my cold, very dark, dirty, infested 1930’s basement that even my hound dog won’t go down into! So now, I just wander into certain stores for inspiration. So for me, the best advice I ever read was in Carolyne Roehm’s Winter Notebook. Carolyne suggests that if expensive paper is out of your reach, then try using white freezer wrap or butcher paper to wrap your presents in, and to splurge, instead, on beautiful ribbon. She also removed the faux fruit off an old wreath and tied that to the ribbon. This is very clever, and indeed a nice way to dress up your packages, and to save some money in the process. Since I’m in the South I even like to use pinecones that are plucked from my own yard.
Picture from Carolyne Roehm's Winter Notebook
I have used just basic white paper the last two years-- I actually bought Crafty Kraft paper from Michael’s retail store. The first Christmas morning, after Michael had wrapped some gifts, his mother popped into the room and said she had some paper upstairs in her wrapping room (she’s very lucky—although it does share space with her washer & dryer). He told her he had it covered, since I had already trained him. Later, when she saw the finished product, she was complementing--how pretty! In the end, I was happy because I saved some money and I still had a nice pretty package to give!
The nice thing is you can use the paper year-round, and you don’t have to worry about snowmen paper, although if you have tiny tots at home, you have to have a little snowman paper. For Valentines Day, of course, just add a red ribbon or for Mother’s Day, you can do pretty light blue, sage green, or pink silk ribbon (unlimited possibilities). So, since I have plenty of Crafty Kraft paper left over from last year and the year before this is one less thing I have to buy! So I am off this morning to fetch some pretty red velvet ribbon!
Picture from Carolyne Roehm's Winter Notebook
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