Green Gift Wrapping Suggestions

I admit it, I stole these great suggestions from a Minnesota state government website. But they are just so clever and creative. I challenge you to incorporate them into your gift wrapping plans this year. I will!

PS - These suggestions save money too.

Trying to avoid the "gift wrap trap?" Here are some great ideas for gift wrapping alternatives.

• Scarves, handkerchiefs or bandannas.
• Old posters and maps.
• Pages from a child's coloring book taped together (especially nice for relatives who would enjoy the artwork).
• Old sheet music.
• Newspapers (foreign newspapers are great).
• Last year's holiday paper (press with warm iron if wrinkled).
• Wallpaper scraps.
• Home-sewn cloth bags.
• Fabric scraps.
• Pictures or advertisements from magazines and catalogs.
• Sunday comic pages.
• A present in a present (for example, a hat in a matching scarf, jewelry in a wooden box, cookies in a reusable tin or cookie jar, barbecue grill utensils or picnic supplies in a tablecloth, kitchen gifts in towels or all-purpose cloths).
• A plain box decorated with leftover glitter, paint, markers, etc.
• A cake pan, basket or a wooden box.
• Reusable decorative bags.
• A “Hollywood box:” individually wrap or decorate the top and bottom of a box with a separate lid. Encourage the recipient to reuse the box.
  Purchase wrapping paper made from recycled paper.

Packaging:

• Dry, popped popcorn (include a note explaining that birds can eat it.)
• Biodegradable starch packing peanuts.
• Used packing peanuts from previous gifts (unwanted packing peanuts, if they are clean, are accepted by many packaging stores for reuse).
• Crumpled ads from the newspaper. (The ink on glossy paper won't smear as it does on the rest of the newspaper.)

For more go HERE