A Craft Paper Christmas

The holiday season has gotten the best of me yet again.

I always have grand plans of wrapping my gifts beautifully, colorfully, and to photographic-perfection (the same way I remember Santa’s presents, or how all of my most envied packaging pins on Pinterest are), but then I get caught in the retail headlights, over-thinking the investment of wrapping supplies, juggling my time (especially when I’d rather be jamming on a certain bear rug), or becoming immediately frustrated by deciding to wrap the round, squishy thing first. (You should know that anything round, squishy, and unboxed inevitably gets launched across the living room, sliding through a pile of dog fur, and then I need to spend more time lint-brushing stuff, humph, Merry Christmas.)

This year’s gifts aren’t wrapped as as ornately and over-the-top as I’d prefer, I guess they photographed well, even if my camera was a little bit tilty for this here shot.

Imperfections and simplicity aside, I do like that I managed a wee bit of consistency this season by choosing to use a roll of brown craft paper (bought with a 50% discount from JoAnn’s) instead of investing in “traditional” printed wrapping paper. For $3, a single roll provided enough square footage to wrap all of my gifts, which I know can’t be said for the comparably priced 45-sq. ft. rolls covered in candy canes and Santa. In hindsight, I do regret not price-comparing that purchase with the brown craft contractor’s paper rolls that are sold at Home Depot and Lowe’s, because I know you can get a hell of a lot of brown paper in those contractor bundles for $10. Clearly, it’s my seasonal mission is to find durable wrapping paper at the best cost per square foot. (Bring it on.)

I used ribbon that was already on hand. Much of the tulle-ish material and gold embossed ribbons were bought at 90% off last January (I wrote about that steal of a deal here) but I supplemented it with a little bit of green sparkly on gifts for my sister and mom (who would be appreciative of the green and the sparkly and also maybe save it to reuse it). At $1.30 a roll for 24-ft of the green sparkles (a Black Friday early bird sale), I couldn’t say no, but I also couldn’t justify buying the whole gamut of colors to make the girliest sparkly rainbow packages ever. (If you’re ever wondering what to get me, look no further than sparkly ribbon. It’s like crack for a DIYer, thanks.)

The best part of working with tulle (and I’ve never used it before, so how would I know this before now) is that it allows the most lux bows that I’ve ever created. So full and lush, I’d almost like to toss my curl-able plastic ribbon and stick with this stuff forever.

Side note: Remember that the tulle at the fabric shop costs about $1.99/yard and you could save yourself a small fortune in full-priced “tulle ribbon” by just buying a few yards of the fabric and carefully cutting into strips. Bazinga.

When simple bows weren’t desired, layered colored tulle knotted loosely turned out nicely. Reminds me of a tutu. But a manly tutu. That’s Dad’s gift.

When all was said and done, the only wrapping investment this year was:

• $3 sale-priced roll of craft paper
• $2.60 in green sparkly
• half of my previously purchased tulle ribbon stash (about $3.15)

That right there is <$9 in wrapping accouterments. (Pete would like me to point out that ribbons aren’t necessary on gifts to men, nor is wrapping paper.)

How have you wrapped your goodies?