As the last day for shipping parcels overseas approaches I find I can turn my mind to things other than Etsy and can start to prepare for my own Christmas celebrations.
I am determined to have as eco friendly a Christmas as possible this year, and I am not going to go and buy lots of glitzy wrapping paper that isn't even accepted in the recycling bins.
So this is my take on environmentally friendly wrapping paper.
First get your self some 100% recycled ordinary brown paper - the sort that is used for wrapping parcels that you want to send through the post. If you are a thrifty kind of soul you probably already have a stash lurking away in the back of a cupboard.
I chose to iron mine first as is was rather creased, but you could equally well embrace the creases by wetting it slightly, crumpling it gently into a ball and then opening out(again, very gently) and leaving to dry. This paper has incredible wet strength and the final result from your "wet crumpling" will be a texture rather like old leather.
Next you simply take a festive rubber stamp (I chose a Merry Christmas word stamp) and simply stamp all over you paper using an air drying ink pad. Cut a co-ordinating tag from a scrap of card and tie the parcel up with some yarn, ribbon or whatever you have to hand. The flower I had in my ex-demo stash, but if I didn't have that I would have just used a paper punch to create some, or perhaps if I had time, knitted some - it really doesn't matter. To my mind the colour co-ordination of the stamping, tag and embellishment makes this gift wrapping just as stylish as the mass produced items that you buy in the shops, and it is earth friendly, hand crafted and unique too.
