by Carol Gioia

Created on: January 23, 2009   Last Updated: August 27, 2010

There are special occasions all year round when you might want to give a present to someone you love.   Often you spend time choosing a perfect present and then hastily place it into a generic gift bag, reluctant to spend almost as much on a more creative wrap as you did on the gift.

Instead of waiting for a specific occasion to think about gift wrap, plan in advance, to ensure you will have cost-effective supplies on hand to wrap your gift.  A creatively wrapped package delights the recipient and opening a gaily wrapped surprise adds an additonal element of fun to your present.

Begin by establishing a gift wrapping box where you can save all sorts of items to be used as potential wraps or toppers. This would include recycled bows from gifts previously received, dried or artifical flowers, leftover bits of ribbon, lace, binding, yarn or any other notions remaining from sewing and scrap booking projects.  Ttwist ties from the grocery store, plastic objects and miniature toys or stuffed animals; any trinkets you come across in the course of daily life that are cute, not useful, but too good to throw away will be the basis for creatively wrapping a gift.

Add to your box  a pair of scissors, pinking shears, a glue gun, Elmer's glue and scotch tape as convenient time savers; readily available when needed.

Whenever the opportunity presents itself, add scraps of material, stickers, comic pages, left over shelf and draw liner, recycled wrappings, colorful containers and tins, interesting bits of fabric salvaged from worn out clothing or household items. You are only limited by your imagination on what to save as a future potential gift wrap.

Add items to your box throughout the year and when a gift-giving occasion presents itself you will be ready to wrap the gift  with your "signature" flair.

Some examples of what your creative efforts can produce:

* Place a gift for your favorite female bride or homemaker in a dish towel or table cloth, gather the top and tie off with twine, insert a couple of wooden spoons in the twine resulting in a "hobo" package.

* A gift for a child's birthday can be put into a new pillowcase with the child's name printed in liquid embroidery, or embossed with his favorite action hero, or her favorite Disney princess. The child will love his/her custom pillowcase as an additional gift.

* Any dad or grandfather would be delighted to open a gift wrapped in plain white shelf paper with his favorite child's colorful drawings all over the surface.

* A romantic gift can be wrapped in shiny tin foil, tied with red yarn and enhanced with a few red sticker hearts, or heart candies glued onto the foil.

* Sometimes the gift is the wrap. For a bridal shower, inserting an article of lingerie into a cookie jar requires no wrapping.

* Humor sometimes dictates an appropriate wrapping. A new book for an avid reader can be presented in "a plain brown wrapper," for his amusement.

* Recycled bubble wrap is fun to use for an older child's gift. After the present is opened, he can have fun busting the bubbles.

* Even a gift card can be presented in a creative fashion. It can be inserted into the outer wrap of a large Hershey bar

When the supplies to wrap a gift are on hand, your imagination takes over and your gift wrappingsl become increasingly more creative and clever. You might find yourself roaming through discount and dollar store, seeking out items for your gift-wrap supply box. Gift wrapping will transform from a chore to a creative endeavor, garnering you a sense of personal satisfaction derived from your own thriftiness, cleverness and creativity.

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