I’ve always lamented how much wrapping paper gets wasted at Christmas time, so this year I came up with some fun ideas on how to wrap gifts without wrapping paper! I love how you can make each gift personalized and extra special without creating unnecessary waste.
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
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Table of Contents
Buy Plain Boxes & Bags
This year I bought simple white paper boxes and bags and embellished them with ribbon, string, customized gift tags, snippets of greenery, and charms! The plain boxes and gift bags can be re-used each year unlike paper, which ends up shredded! They also aren’t season-specific and you could use them for any holiday or occasion with different embellishments.
Use Leftover Craft Supplies
I used bits of ribbon and string that I already had on hand as well as leftover mini brass bells from making garlands. You could use anything you have on hand. My kids fully embraced this idea and they had fun decorating with pipe cleaners, glitter glue, and random stickers. You can make your gifts a little more refined, but the idea is the same lol. Get creative and use up leftover supplies. Your craft room will end up decluttered as a bonus!
Create Custom Gift Tags
You could make name tags for each member of the family that could be reused year after year. There are some really beautiful options for personalized gift tags, wooden gift tags, and even leather gift tags. Instead of throwing out paper tags or stickers each season why not make beautiful permanent tags part of your Christmas traditions!
Attach Photos or Art
You could also add photos or custom art to your boxes and gift bags!
Below, I’ve used a clothespin to attach a custom watercolour print to the front of a plain white gift bag! It adds colour and style to the bag, but also doubles as a second gift!
You could also add a photo of the person receiving the gift, or even better, a favourite photo of the two of you together. This is a favourite with kids, they love seeing images of themselves and it makes it easy for them to see which present is they can’t read.
Wrap with Cloth
Depending on the gift, use any soft material item like tea towels, sponge cloths, scarves, baby blankets etc… to wrap your present!
Reuse Cardboard Boxes
This year I made these cute gingerbread house gift boxes out of plain cardboard boxes! They are cute, fun to make and bonus: they totally disguise whatever gift you put inside. Reuse all those Amazon delivery boxes this year instead of sending them straight to the recycling bin.
Recycle Papers
Use paper that you already have lying around the house! Old sheet music, kids’ art, newspaper sheets, maps or calendar pages can all make pretty gift wrap!
I hope you’ve enjoyed these tips on how to wrap gifts without wrapping paper. It feels so good to not only get creative with wrapping your gifts but also to cut down on the holiday clutter. Have fun wrapping!
MORE GOOD READS:
I love these ideas Jenny! They are each so pretty!
Who’s Jenny? ???? Thanks Kerry!!
I love the image of the girl holding a tree. Can you please share where you got it? Thanks.
This was actually a custom painting and right now it’s not available in a full-size print but there’s a mini version that is part of my advent calendar tags!