All wrapped up

Thanks to Nathan for his insight in to the world of glass blowing. He truly is a civil servant of many talents. Someone needs to tell him this metric malarkey really won't catch on though.

For those of us that don't have a Ninja suit to hand, I thought I would share how I've wrapped my presents to go under the tree this year.

As a number of my friends and family will be receiving stock-ings (as in, stock from the shop wrapped attractively and presented in a way so as to fool them I paid full price), I found I was wrapping a number of smaller items up for people rather than one big present.

I dislike awkward stacks, so decided to do something with a stocking feel, but without the stocking. This was all very last minute as I basically chose to ignore Christmas entirely until about a week ago. I didn't have time to make pretty stockings for everyone, so I went down the calico bag route. These can be purchased in various different sizes, and colours in fact, and are relatively inexpensive. Also, they can be kept and used again next year, saving on land fill.

I opted for natural bags because I was being indecisive, but it did mean I could print them with regular water based ink pads. I borrowed some snow flake lino cuts Amy made and printed my bags with random clusters of snow flakes in pastel colours (chosen based on the crochet lace we had most of!). If I'd had more time, I would have used block printing inks in the Berylune Studio, where there is space to spread out and dry the prints, but alas I had to tackle my project at home.

Unfortunately, you can often see dark text on the gifts inside with this light coloured bag, so I opted to wrap my contents as well (sorry land fill), but if you choose a bag in a darker colour, additional wrapping isn't necessary. Great if you hate wrapping!


I decorated my plain luggage tags and kraft wrapped presents with a bit of washi and some crochet lace. I have spent much more time and money on far less attractive presents in previous years! The fabric bags are really tactile and you can throw in a satsuma, a hand full of nuts and some sweeties from Lantern to make them feel really special.

I'll try to get Amy to post some pictures of her wrapping this year (using red lace and green ric rac I think?), but she is rubbish at taking pictures and allergic to keyboards...