I am the sort of person that is always storing up odd and ends and swearing I am going to use them later for some purpose and then when I am do am immensely chuffed with myself and Mr. H gets to hear about it for at least a week!
O also I am really cheap so that is another reason that upcycling things like packing paper that I did not pay for makes me so very very happy.
So this year I gave myself the mission of wrapping all of Mr. H’s Christmas presents with things I already had rather than buying wrapping paper.
From the front left I used:
Gift bag I cut open
Amazon packing paper, rubber stamps from college, and ribbon I bought two summer ago
Gold tissue paper I bought sometime before our move in 2011, red ribbon that was the gift bag handle
Brown packing paper also from an Amazon order, same old ribbon
Red tissue paper I found in the gift bag, the candy can I glued on which was an old gift tag
Another thing that I like to do is make the gift giving a bit more fun and silly is instead of putting just putting Mr. H’s name on the presents I like to put some of his nicknames. This one DJ Fan Man is really dorky and has a very long backstory I will not bore you with but it will make Mr. H laugh which is what I was going for!
I also like to deter him from figuring out what is what so I will do things like put a small present in a big box or like that package in gold is a book which I wrapped in big bubble wrap that was from a glass my grandparents sent so all wrapped up it looks more like a shirt than a book!
What do you think would you reuse materials to wrap presents?
I think the presents you’ve wrapped look great! We have princess wrapping paper left over from Sam’s niece’s birthday last year, so I’ve wrapped presents in that. Hope everyone likes being a princess! x
Thank you and some princess paper can never be wrong!
Instead of gift tags, I would use pics of me and that person that I have lying around from the olden days when we actually had to develop film. lol. :)
That sounds so sweet and sentimental I love it!
The only time it backfires if you have one of those people who doesn’t like their photo taken–so you don’t have any photos. lol. Then you have to make other plans (like use old Christmas cards that don’t have writing on the front side or that you don’t have envelopes for.
These presents look good! I like to use pages from magazines to wrap presents :)
I was thinking if I ran out of things we have a few music magazines tucked away!
I really love minimalist wrapping – brown paper & white ribbons.
Yes me too!
Cutting open a gift bad? BRILLIANT. Oh my word. I reuse paper ALL THE TIME. I’m such a paper and ribbon hoarder.
Dang it! I mean bag. Not bad. I don’t even know what a gift bad is.
Thanks out of one gift bag you can do a whole lot!
I’m terrible at throwing things away, but equally terrible about upcycling them. I’m going to try harder next year when we finally have a house. I want to try and get creative with decorating! I love this, and I certainly don’t think it’s cheap – it’s environmentally friendly, but also really respectful of the value of things that still have a use. I read somewhere recently that packaging isn’t a waste if you can do something with it.
I had to get better at upcycling as Mr. H started throwing things away which annoyed me!
I’m always saving stuff to use as wrapping paper because I really don’t like paying for the wrapping. I love your ideas of disguising the presents :)
One of the best ways is to save a cereal box and then put something that is easily identifiable like a book in it!
I’m the same – the mounds of paper left over at christmas really are criminal (against recycling of course). I saw plantable wrapping paper the other day – it’s layers of biodegradable tissue to make a strong paper with seeds embedded so you can pop it in the ground, fab idea isn’t it!
O that sounds like something I would love to get when we have a garden some day!