Someone started a list of gift ideas. How about a list for ideas for wrapping gifts?

Make pillow cases. Put the gift in that.

Wrap in fat quarters, or if a quilt wrap in a pillowcase to match. My brother in law used to use comics to wrap all his christmas gifts with.

I have made pillowcases in Christmas fabrics to "wrap" the grandkids' gifts in.

Make a tote or purse for the wrapping of a gift, or gift card. I have seen gift card envelopes made of fabric.

All of our gifts this year will be "wrapped" in reusable grocery bags. This will put an average of 3 bags into each kitchen. We are making a special effort to find nice ones that are not marked for a particular store so that the recipients can shop wherever they like.

I make totes or do furoshiki. A lot of times I get the fabric back on the furoshiki ;-)

Look at this:

http://www.wrapagain.com/howdoesitwork.html

I wrap many gift in reusable bags from TJ Max and Homegoods. They sell them for only $1 and are then reusable. Have not noticed if they will have a christmas ones but used them for about 8 weddings this summer.

We are making a special effort to find nice ones that are not marked for a particular store so that the recipients can shop wherever they like.
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Find lovely, sturdy canvas and put some sort of applique over the store brand. These will last for years. I have one from a local store and for a 1970s fan, I put a peace sign over the store's name. She keeps it in her restored Partridge Family style van.

Years ago when my kids were young, I was frustrated at seeing them destroy the beautiful and expensive gift wrap paper I had purchased from their school fundraiser. Budget was tighter then but I managed to hit the after Christmas sale at a local craft store. I purchased that year and the next two years all I could afford in fabric after Christmas. All Christmas fabrics. I serged lots an lots of bags of all sizes for our Christmas presents. My thoughts were always to buy beautiful gold cord to tie around them...but that never happened. Instead my BH and I would wrap Christmas presents as we purchased them thru the year in these bags, label them and close them with large postal rubber bands and sale tags with string upon them. We reused the labels and rubber bands each year. Well many years have passed and we celebrate with less bags today, as in those days...but here is what I am in the process of doing.
A small group of 20 quilters exchanged blocks of different sized for over 2 years with each other. All these blocks are really beautiful and many of them appliqued. But I swapped for for two people which meant I would receive 40 blocks back. Now I am in the process of cutting up many of our Christmas sacks and adding the different 40 blocks to make my four grown children their own Christmas Quilts. Hope to have the project finished in 2011. If I do, I will post the four different quilts! And yes, I have quilted several quilts made from the exchanged blocks and they are very, very beautiful!

I am trying not to buy ANY gift wrap at all this year! I want to make some bags, because theycan be reused!

what my mom and I do is we go to costco and get the plain gold and silver paper there for the whole year and then wrap our gifts in that. and we get that really cool wire ribbon also. that adds the pop to the package. I have been thinking about just making gift wrap from Christmas fabric for the holidays for just our family. I like Quilter4hireandfun's idea of making bags for their Christmas presents. I am tired of spending all the money on the paper for Christmas. Will have to talk to my mom about this idea. it should be fun to do.

I like this idea (and it's easy to copy). This month's Quilter's World Magazine has an article USE YOUR STASH..Make Your Own Wrapping Scarves. They are just squares of fabric using one or two together tied at the top. I've got ideas for using my fabrics that aren't nice enough to put into a quilt for a year round supply of family gift wrappers. Next week I hope to make some bags.

I meant to include this in my reply.

Depends on the size of the gift but if there is enough money and enough time, I like to wrap a gift in a gift. I've given lots of things away tucked inside totebags, placemats, and pillowcases.

When I give something small and flat, like tickets to a play, or a gift card, they can be wrapped in photo albums, gloves, socks. I once gave cooking classes to a friend and wrapped the certificate in an oven mitt.

My husband has gotten into the habit as well. He gave me a pearl ring in a soup tureen and diamond stud earrings in a tea kettle.

Just make sure you are there when the person opens the gift so that they get ALL the gifts!

Great ideas! Thanks.

My son uses newspaper to wrap his gifts, if funnys are available he uses them.

My DD wrapped my Christmas gift in a FQ last year and I thought it was adorable. Also, she uses old maps. ETSY has some great ideas and she goes there often.

These are some great ideas.

I have also used towels. Bath, hand or tea towels. Whatever the size of the gift calls for! This also works for weddings gifts or anything else.

I have 7 children and for years have made fabric bags to use for wrapping. I don't like all the waste that paper creates. The bags are then recycled for many years to come. I have made them in many different sizes and each year create what I need. My kids always enjoy this and people outside our family love the bags they get their gifts in too! I attach ribbon ties to the bags and can attach name tags to the ribbon when putting the gift in. :)

Thanks so much for this site!

I use fabric and most of the time I get it back because only one daughter sews. For baby gifts, wrap in a receiving blanket or hooded towel. Use little socks for bows. For weddings, wrap in a tea towel or table cloth. Use pot scrubbers for bows.

What a cleaver idea that is. an it is pretty when all wrapped up. Jan

I have used bags and boxes from kids meals in the past if they were clean. Most of the time it still had the toy inside of it.

My gifts are usually "built" and so I take a bowl, serving tray as my base and add things to my base. Then wrap in cello with a big bow. This year, the gifts will be included in a big reusable bag.......I'm going GREEN!!! LOL

The Dec issue of Quilters World has an article on wraps for gifts.

kwiltnutt

We haven't bought gift wrap paper in years. When we were young and in the Navy we were so hard up that my neighbour gave me her Sunday paper so the kids could read the funnys, then I used these and wraped their gifts in them and they looked okay to me. The kids really liked it and what a save.

What is a Furoshiki?

I googled Furoshiki and came up with this site which shows various way to tie your cloth which you can print or save as a pdf .

http://www.env.go.jp/en/focus/attach/060403-5.html

http://furoshiki.com/techniques/

I did the same and at this site if you click on the picture it takes you to the directions. I don't know how many are the same, but fun new find.

A friend showed me a reusable grocery bag she bought at a bazaar which had a decorative fabric sewn to the front. I wonder if you could fuse it on without melting the bag.

I used a coupon to buy a pinking edge for my rotary cutter. Now I make my own "ribbon" from scraps!

I have so much fabric in my stash and lots of dish towels on which to applique, I'm going to take some of these clever suggestions and make my own this year. Love the idea of gifts within gifts also. You folks have got me in the spirit.

I stick a card inside the tote I have made for the gift.

That's a really great idea. :-P

What a wonderful idea. Thanks for sharing this site with us all. :lol:

Decorate small and med size brown bags with pieces of christmas paper. I used some bags that I got from bath and body.

At the hardware store, you can buy a roll of brownish paper made for painters (they use it as a barrier with blue tape) which is very cheap and the roll is very long. It wraps up nice and you can add a great ribbon or stickers or let the kids draw on it.