Saturday, December 14, 2013

Green Christmas Present wrapping

A couple of years ago we came up with an idea to wrap Christmas presents that didn't kill trees.  I love wrapping Christmas presents and my family has always gone overboard wrapping everything in the house that belongs to somebody so they can give it to someone else, so wrapping paper has always been precious.  We usually spend more on it than on the presents.  I remember as a kid saving our coins and walking to the store all happy because we had enough for another roll of cheap wrapping paper. Saving wrapping paper for a whole year in a house that is full of curious rambunctious kids and is already crowded to the point that we don't really have room for lots of clothes each, let alone used wrapping paper from last year, gets hard - so it always drives me nuts to see all the wrapping paper go away or even get recycled, besides it takes all the fun out of the hyper chaos of Christmas morning to say "be careful to not rip the wrapping paper".  If I ever had to say that, I might as well not bother to wrap up my old shoelaces tied in beautiful knots - it would take all the fun out of it!  So we ended up desperately wrapping presents in things like the cut off legs of worn out pants that were stretchy and Christmas colors.  This actually worked so well that I think, you could make some stretchy wrapping tubes that you tie on each end with pretty ribbon, and sell them to people to wrap Christmas presents in year after year.  I know that people use bags over and over again to avoid the wrapping paper, but they don't quite give the "giant pile of Christmas presents under the tree" feel, they are too easy for babies to peek in or pull your presents out of whether you want to peek or not, and they too get torn up around here...

 

It would be fun to make these out of old clothes.  Ideally they are so easy to make even I can make them and I don't sew.  But making and selling them locally would also be good for those who couldn't or didn't want to.  Strong solid stretch velvet colors work best and aren't see through when they stretch like other stretch cloth and they look like royal gifts!  If you are selling locally or need new material:
 sparkly tulle (yes, you will probably get sparklies everywhere):
I just sew a strip of tulle by each end to tie into a bow.
 
 
silver
 

stretch velevet

through Fabric Bravo (grouping them so you can maybe save on shipping):
 
 

Stretch Velvet Plum Fabric   


Or Fabric Exchange:
 

 
Hunter Green Stretch Velvet

 Or if you want to spend more money and be fancy with beautiful glitter (ShavaliFabric): 



Stretch Velvet White With Silver Glitter



                              

Stretch Velvet Fabric Royal Blue Glitter

 
 
 

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