Gift Wrapping

My wrapping for little Scarlet's present.

Some assorted wrapping I have done over the years.

Colourful wrapping spotted at Ariel Booksellers.






The amazing Lena Corwin shows us some divine Christmas Wrapping from her friend Karen.













I love wrapping presents! Each year I begin planning my Christmas Wrapping theme months in advance. For me, it is one of the most exciting parts about Christmas. (Oh and of course the tree decoration and spending time with family and friends).

So...here are a few gift wrapping ideas I have found helpful:

1. I started a ribbon and trims box collecting odd pieces throughout the year. I use the long bits of ribbon to tie around gifts and I make bows and gift tag ties from the mini-me lengths.

2. I love using recycled paper or wallpaper off-cuts for interesting wrapping. I once found 6 rolls of canary yellow floral 1960's wallpaper on ebay and used it to wrap all of my gifts at Christmas. If I see something in a magazine I love, or a cute press release or poster, I make a few colour photocopies of it and use to gift wrap small trinkets like a lipstick or hair bow.

3. I generally save off-cuts of gift wrap and use them as a kind of belly band or feature strip on other gifts to add a nice contrast to the main gift wrap. (see Ariel wrapping picture above) But note - eek! Expect to store a big box of scrap paper for this one!

4. I think bows and corsages on gifts are so cute when formed out of unexpected materials such as pipe cleaners, leaves and crepe paper. I love to include fake flowers or paper doily's purchased from variety stores (see first pic).

5. I always invest in some pretty tape to give attention to detail to the underside of the gift (and to use to attach decoration to the top of the gift). At the moment my favourites are a lemon yellow gingham tape, some metallic coloured tape given to me by my lovely friend Lisa when she moved to NYC (thanks Leesie!) and some MT polka-dot tape.

6. Sometimes I wrap gifts in a pastel coloured tissue paper, then scatter with some glitter or paper confetti and re-wrap in some biodegradable cellophane. Not to be advised if the present opening is taking place at your house! (>_<)

7. I make my gift tags each year from scanning either my custom Christmas card design or my favourite image, scaling it down to gift tag size and step and repeating to print on A4 paper. Either that or I use little cardboard off-cuts or manila tags and stamp the recipients name with these with Kikki K Wooden Alphabet stamps. Time consuming but well worth it!

Now I am so inspired by all the lovely gift wrapping ideas seen on these beautiful blogs I can hardly wait for Summer to start planning my wrapping theme! :)

You can check out some eco wrapping tips here.

Cute little face wrapping seen on Tas-ka.

My Christmas wrapping from 2007.





The lovely Handmade romance made these pretty bows from this inspiration.




Sweet little 'Hello Happy' tags from The Small Object.


And this eco friendly gift wrapped present by this flickr poster.

Ikea's 2008 Christmas wrapping paper collection.


Plastic Bag pom poms from the very clever Creature Comforts.


Lena Corwin shows us a great way to recycle scrap pieces of fabric furoshiki style.


Some Eco-wrapping ideas from Martha Stewart.


Imagine these little corsages individually as little bows upon gifts!





I must say, having some lovely sticky tape is a big help! I stocked up on MT tape when I was in Tokyo last October.


Some lovely gift wrapping ideas from this Japanese wrapping book.














Or failing all this, if it all just gets too much, just leave a little comment below and for a small price I will wrap all of your gifts for you this Christmas! :) Job done!

Love Love
Hello Sandwich
xxx