Wrap it up

I have wanted to start posting some DIYs onto my blog and what better way to start than with wrapping presents :-)  It's something that I am know for in my family and I just want to share my crazy love of wrapped presents with the world.

Let me preface this blogpost by stating that: yes, I do know that I am a dork.  (I am, after all,  about to write a tutorial on wrapping presents)

I am fully aware of the fact that I have a tendency to go a little overboard in this area.

 I don't think it is at all strange that one of my dream jobs is to work in the gift wrap department of Macys.

What can I say? I just like wrapping presents.

I also know that it is strange for me to be offering this tutorial AFTER the holidays, but just posting as I promised here :-)

So with that said, after all the comments over the years on my wrapped presents, I have decided to launch this tutorial.  I will be using pics that my sis took while I was wrapping Christmas presents. 

I always start with a very plain wrapping paper.  This year for Christmas, I chose a plain brown kraft paper:

First I cut the width of paper that I need.  I am weird and always have to have a straight cut on my wrapping paper rolls, so sometimes I wind up wrapping the paper around the present a few times.  Yes, I know...wasteful (shame on me).
After paper is cut, tape one end onto back of package to keep it from shifting.  Then wrap the paper around the package, going over the tapped portion and fold on the creased edge.  Here is where another of my funny little quirks comes in.  I can't have any tapped paper in the middle of a package.  It always has to be on a edge, so I crease along the edge and fold under the leftover paper.  Like this:



Yeah, pretty edges :-)  Tape it down and flip the box to wrap up the sides.  For the sides, I always fold the paper in on the sides and secure them first (don't have a picture, but you get the idea right).  I usually have a long piece left on the top and bottom, so what I do is crease the top portion like so:

Cut off the extra paper like this and then tape it down:

Now that the top edge is taped down flip the package over to do the bottom.  Crease like before.  Cut off the access, but this time leave enough paper to fold under.



Look at the pretty clean edge being made.  I tape along the edge and at each corner:


Do the same on the other side of the package.  I usually wind up with quite a lot of scraps.  The picture below is my Christmas presents leftovers:



But there were lots of presents :-)

Don't judge me please.

I love our planet too :-)

Now the pretty part - sprucing things up.  This year I have been kinda obsessed with sewing onto paper so I made my Christmas tags out of two pieces of paper sewed together and then I sewed buttons on.  Cute, yes?


I decided to overlay one type of ribbon over the other and wanted a few different options, resulting in the purchasing of the following ribbons:

First I put the wider ribbon on the package securing both ends of the ribbon on the back of the box - the only place where it is ok for tape to actually show :-)

I then put the more narrow ribbon around the box and tied a simple knot on the front:


Then I attached the tag.  This one was for Mama Doris and Papa:

And voila!

I was all about some simplicity this past Christmas.  I have also done things like:
- using small mirrors and writing names on them for gift tags
- painting names onto small Christmas ornaments for name tags
- used newspaper instead of wrapping paper

Happy wrapping!!!