Getting Crafty With Gift Wrap

Another Christmas craft that I keep going back to is using Trader Joe's bags for wrapping paper. 

Trader Joe's is great because at least for the past 3 years they have seasonal brown paper bags with different Christmasy patterns on them. 



Although, you can still achieve a similar look using the plain side of any paper grocery bag or kraft paper. A lot of wrapping paper uses rolled up kraft paper instead of a tube when you reach the end of a roll. This year I even used that for wrapping a couple presents. No waste whatsoever!

One thing I should warn is that the paper is really stiff so it doesn't work well in all situations. If your gift is an odd shape I would recommend using a gift box. Or in my case, given that my gift recipients know me and know how frugal I am, I do not shy away from using everything from a cereal box, to a Pringles container to put the present in before I wrap it. It actually brings back childhood memories for me because my parents did this with our difficult-to-wrap-presents. Mom and dad would always jokingly exclaim "It's a toaster!" or "We thought you'd want a box of diapers! Ha ha" and we'd all laugh as we hurriedly opened the box to find what was really inside. 

Anyway, once you have your box wrapped you are going to want to dress it up a bit. 



I have already shown these Trader Joe's wrapped presents adorned with twine, greenery, and photo gift tags.



This year I changed it up with my first ever attempt at crafting with duct tape. I must admit, I think I'm hooked. 



I used this tutorial for the bow and just modified it by adding ribbons at the end. 



I also used the photo gift tags again. The ones that I shared about last week. 

Side note. I was thrilled to get see this message on Facebook today that said "Thanks for the great gift tag idea! Love your blog :) " 

That just made my day. I am sure their teachers are going to be thrilled to see who these gifts are from. 

Gifts are like people, it's what's on the inside that counts. Then again, I think we all like to get dressed up from time to time.

 Tis the season!