Classic Christmas Wrapping | DIY Classic Christmas

“Brown paper packages tied up with strings, these are a few of my favorite things.” I adore Christmas decorations, particularly classic Christmas decorations. The hand painted wooden nutcrackers, the white lights, candlelight, gold stars, and brown paper packages tied up with strings. I know that wrapping gifts, especially for people like myself who aren’t the best wrappers, can be time consuming and doesn’t always come out looking as we had hoped. I have complied some simple tips to make your holiday wrapping simple, lovely, and even a little more eco-friendly.

Put on the Christmas music and gather your wrapping paper, scissors, tape, and ribbons because we’re going to create a simple and classic look for the gifts we give. For wrapping paper I almost always use brown recycled paper as it is friendlier to the environment and I really love the classic look. It can be dressed up with all sorts of decorations and always makes the gift recipient smile. Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” playing on the record player. Don’t forget to bring a friend. Hosting a wrapping party is fun. We all have to wrap, so why not do it as a group? Over the weekend Madeleine joined me for my wrapping festivities. Although, I have a feeling it was only the string that she was after.Because I keep my wrapping paper simple, I love to dress it up with some colorful strings and ribbons. I found this fun assortment (that I can reuse the spools to hold sewing materials) at TJ Maxx. I bought this set last year and I still had some gold ribbons left over.Another essential wrapping tool for larger ribbons and bows: a hot glue gun. You can borrow one from a friend or find one of your own at a local craft store. They’re very affordable and so handy to create a seamless seal when glueing ribbons together. It holds better than tape for tricky adornments and is easier to hide.For wrapping paper I stick with a classic and recycled brown, but every once in a while I’ll find something beautiful that adds to my wrapping  collection. I do this for many reasons: it is better for the environment, I only need one or two rolls so it is very simple to store, and I can use it for every holiday and occasion. I save so much money on wrapping paper every year because I don’t have a huge assortment that is designed for a specific person based on age or gender. I don’t have to worry about having too much of one color and not enough of the other. I love the simplicity of only buying a roll or two as needed and not having to store a whole box of papers for next year. Another way to decorate plain paper packages is with rubber stamps. I have a collection of stamps, especially for the holidays, that make lovely wrapping papers or tags. Reuse old jewelry boxes to hold gift cards. Use stamps and string to make personalized tags. If a bag is in good shape I will fold it up and save it to reuse. The silver bow on the red bag is from last year and the tissue paper in the brown bag is also recycled from a breakable gift I purchased earlier in the week. Some gifts are oddly shaped, especially fabric gifts such as scarves, mittens, hats, gloves, etc. I roll some paper around the middle and tie the ends to look like a giant candy wrapper. It is easy to do and gets the job done. You can decorate the paper by painting dots, stripes, or other designs on it. The brown paper is a blank canvas.
Other eco-friendly wrapping tips:

• If you don’t need to wrap the gift or if it very oddly shaped, don’t wrap it. Why waste the paper and add more garbage to a landfill?
• Reuse boxes like the holiday boxes above or wrap a shoe box in brown paper and decorate it.
• Reuse shopping bags like this whole foods bag below. If you cut along the edges you can use the plain inside panels to create simple brown wrapping paper.
• Recycle your paper when you are done.
• Choose ribbons and strings that are not made of plastic. Also choose spools that are made of cardboard that can be recycled or wood that may be reused to hold other ribbons and things in the future.
• Choose decorations such as strings, ribbons, bows with care to the environment.
• Last year our Christmas tree was tied to our car with brown twine. I reused that twine on all of the gifts I wrapped last year.
• This time of year a lot of clothing comes tied up in white or cream ribbons. I keep those for wrapping gifts.
• Buy experiences as gifts instead of things (examples include tickets to shows or sports games, museum passes, art classes, outdoor activities, music lessons, and other activities the people in your lives love to do or have wanted to do for a long time).
• Instead of large gift bags consider giving the gift in a cute and affordable reusable tote. The tote bag itself makes a cute gift and the receiver can use it for groceries and shopping.

I still have more wrapping and decorating to do (especially stamping), but this has been a great start. I hope that you have learned some new eco-friendly wrapping tips and found inspiration to create simple but lovely classic Christmas wrapping ideas.  Happy wrapping!