A holiday wRap

While I wish this post included a self-produced holiday rap such as this classic:

I'm actually talking about wrapping paper. Sorry for the lyrical let-down, everyone but wasn't that a fun throw-back? I thought so too.  On the flip-side, I do think I've found a pretty cost effective and snazzy way to make a gift look good. 

Rather than shelling out the dough for fancy wrap, I paid just a little over $3 for 15 ft. of postal packaging wrap. I certainly can't claim this idea as my own, because this is something my oh-so-crafty mom came up with when my sister and I were growing up. She let us create our own "custom" wrapping paper by buying the postal paper, rounding up a bunch of festive rubber stamps and letting us unleash our creativity on the packaging. 

At the time, I just enjoyed playing with the stamps but in retrospect, it was a pretty ingenious way to incorporate us into the gift-giving process and make everyone's gift a little bit more special. 

Fast forward to Holiday 2011 where I've re-vamped this take on plain brown wrapping paper. Here are a few of my packages this year:

Fun ribbon and rubber stamps.

More ribbon and stamps.

Sparkly stickers for an extra pop.

And then some gifts don't need any wrap at all. Just a ribbon!