Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Gift storage

Q: How do you store wrapped packages so they don't get wrinkled and crushed?

A: I use one of my laundry corner's cabinets to hold paper, cards, ribbon and shipping supplies. I usually wrap the packages atop my dryer. When I'm done, I stack the packages on top of the cabinets until shipping time. The bows will likely get flattened in shipping, but there's only so much I can do about that!

I realized it made no sense to have a gift closet and wrapping paper in separate storage. Now, if I find a complete gift, I go ahead and wrap it immediately. Saves so much space!

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have a storage area in the basement where my furnace is, the kids NEVER go in there...too scary...so I generally just lay the boxes out until it's time to pass them around!

Amy said...

Great idea-- I need to put my gift stash in the same place as my wrapping supplies, too.

I hunted through your blog today to find an old post you had about roasted nuts as a gift- that one stuck in my memory. I may be using your idea for Christmas gifts for my coworkers-- I blogged about it today: http://amy-tinyblessings.blogspot.com/2007/11/todays-frugal-christmas-shopping.html
Thanks for the idea! :)

Anonymous said...

When my granchildren were still small and spent lots of time in our home I kept all of their wrapped gifts in the trunk of my car until Christmas Eve.

Cyndi Lewis said...

Timely as usual, Meredith!

I just had to wrap my first presents last night because they were sizable and I didn't have a place to store them secretly. It makes sense to wrap all finished gifts immediately and store wrap and gifts all together.

Anonymous said...

We don't use wrapping page. WE use gift bags, over and over again. I keep gifts in a rubber main tub or in a corner of the closet. I don't have trouble with peeking from my seven children.

We wrap gifts 5 seconds before we give. Get the gift, slip it in a bag, and you're done.

For larger gifts (among the family) I use pillow cases. If necessary, one could also sew some bags out of cheap cotton.

But we are officially done with wrapping paper, rolls, scotch tape and ribbon and bows. I keep a small stash of tissue paper for 'covering' the top of the gift bag. and I make my own cards. Much much cheaper than a bought card.

Grace

Anonymous said...

I am using the top of my closet this year to store supplies. As for where to store gifts that need to be mailed or just stored for out of the eyes of children. I am still working on that. I love to use real ribbon on gifts. This year I found some cute ribbon that say's Merry Christmas, only the letters are candy canes. So when I was at the dollar store I found candy cane wrapping paper that was really cute.

Mrs. Fussy Fussypants said...

Ah, you frugal goddess, you.
Martha Stewart nees to watch her back! ;)

Meredith said...

You may remember that I "inherited" my grandma's stash of gift bags, which my husband hung on a ladder hook for storage.

I have to ship about half my gifts to family, and I find that gift bags don't pack all that well. For those, I pick up wrapping paper only a yard sales. The tightly packed, flat packages stay intact better that way.

Mom of thirteen said...

On a related topic, with our large family (twelve children) we wrap gifts as we get them and store them until the tree is up or if it is after the tree is up, they go right under the tree so as to not clog up our closet. (yes, no Santa at our house) What REALLY makes this work for us is that we don't put NAMES on the gifts, but use a number system instead. I keep a tracking list with the gift number (stuck with tape onto the gift) and who it is for on it hidden from the children. This way no one knows which gift is theirs and we have no problems with children being overly tempted to peak when we aren't looking.

For more detailed information you can read my blog post on this very topic from last December: http://trophyofgodsgrace.blogspot.com/2006/12/wfmw-putting-gifts-under-tree.html