Take the stress out of Christmas with these handy Christmas wrapping tips
It’s that time of year again…the marathon of present wrapping for all the family! Buying the perfect gift may be simple but if you’re one of those who leave all your wrapping until 2am on Christmas Eve, this blog is here to help you with handy tips to make wrapping easier, simpler and as beautiful and impressive as possible.
Embrace Double Sided Tape
If you want your wrapping to look much more professional replace your regular sellotape with double sided tape so you can hide any sign of tape on your package and give your wrapping a flawless, high-end finish. Our in-house gift wrapping expert at An Hour Earned, Kat, also swears by the small, clear glue dots you can buy for mounting photos (just like these) or a hot glue gun if you’re attaching bows, ribbon or tags to your packages. Your glue is easily hidden underneath whatever you’re using so ugly tape won’t show and spoil your beautifully wrapped gift.
Make sure you decorate!
If you want to upgrade your gifts, include an extra special decoration. Tiny ornaments, candy canes, winter greenery or even contrasting decorative paper can be used to make your wrapping more festive and even personalise it for the recipient. You can even investigate the technique of incorporating pleats in the paper as you wrap so you can tuck sprigs of greenery, cards or tiny extra gifts into your wrapping. Here’s a helpful tutorial!
Colour Code your gifts
Don’t want the hassle of writing tags or labelling every present? Try colour coding your packages using a different colour or design of wrapping paper for each recipient. As long as you make sure you remember whose colour is whose it’s a great way to save some time when you’re wrapping.
Wrap your gifts upside down
People naturally open gifts at the seams so if you wrap your gifts right side up the gift will be upside down when they open it. If you put your gift on the paper upside down when you wrap it, they’ll unwrap a present that’s facing the right way up and give you the most impactful reveal of your carefully chosen gift.
Go paper free
If you’re concerned about your ecological footprint and want your wrapping to be more planetfriendly then the Japanese technique of Furoshiki wrapping could be for you. Furoshiki uses cloth materials to wrap special gifts. Tea towels, bandanas, scarves or napkins, in fact any kind of cloth can be used and will become a beautiful part of the gift you’re giving.
Inconvenient Shapes
Generally it’s simple to get a beautifully neatly wrapped present if your package is a neat square or rectangle but what if it’s not? Don’t you just love trying to wrap that cuddly teddy or cylindrical candle?
There are a couple of ways to embrace inconveniently shaped gifts. The simplest is just to make your life easier by putting it in a box and wrapping that…easy-peasy. If you don’t want to use an extra box you could try making your own gift bag. Just cut your paper slightly wider than needed to fit round your gift, fold the two long sides into the centre (one slightly overlapping the other) and tape closed. To create the bottom of your bag fold up a quarter of the paper from the bottom and open the resulting flap to create a diamond shape. The two side triangles are then folded in and taped together to create the base of the bag. Then just pop in your present and fold over the top to seal (here’s a handy tutorial).
And remember…if you’re wrapping a box and find you’ve cut your paper a little too small try turning your box on the diagonal and using your paper corner-to-corner and it might just fit!
Storing your leftover paper rolls
If you have wrapping paper rolls left over and want to save them for next year a couple of empty toilet rolls are fantastic for holding the rolls closed without risking the wrinkles which can be caused by elastic bands. Simply cut down the long side of the tube and slide it over the roll. One at each end will keep your rolls safely wrapped and enable you to easily store the paper ready for next Christmas.
And remember…
Christmas is meant to be a joyful time of year, so if sourcing, shopping and wrapping your gifts isn’t something you enjoy a personal concierge service like An Hour Earned can take the hard work off your shoulders by buying, wrapping and even shipping all your gifts…leaving you free to enjoy the Christmas season…with no more 2am wrapping sessions. Just get it touch to find out how we can help!
This blog was possible thanks to our in-house Gift Wrapper and Christmas Elf, the endlessly creative Kat, who did a stellar job wrapping many, many presents this year. Thank you as always!
Do you find Christmas wrapping stressful? These helpful hints and tips will help to take some of the stress away and give you simple ideas for how to up your wrapping game this year!