It's been a tough year for our family. Dealing AGAIN with the possible loss of a friend and someone we consider a family member all over addiction. And again it's alcohol.

I've taken charge of ordering gifts online. In the process we've received yards and yards of plain brown kraft paper and the silver Hazmat fire-safe wrapping paper as shipping material.

Out of respect for current situations and not wanting to go overboard with fancy wrappings, decorations, and ribbons, I started wrapping our Christmas presents in the yards of brown and silver shipping paper instead of going to the store and buying gift wrap. Even hand-made fancy ribbons and gift tags from the scraps, and decorated the boxes using colored sharpies.

I wanted the emphasis to be on the thought put into the gifts, not the fancy trimmings. However my wife is not happy seeing a bunch of plan brown packages under the tree, and wants me to re-wrap them.

When I was a kid we received gifts wrapped in the Sunday comics. Part of the gift was reading the comics.

Remember what IS important this Holiday season.

So true Cac.Not many realize what is important until it is gone. I have opened many a gift wrapped up in a Winn Dixie grocery sack from my father. I would give anything for him to be here today as I miss seeing him trying to wrap gifts especially with those brown paper sacks, (Looked like two monkeys fighting over a box of crayons.) It was funny as all get out to watch but it always brought that special feeling. Not one of "Oh I am getting a gift" but one of knowing I was very lucky to have a father that was willing and cared enough to go through such for his family as he hated wrapping things.

The most memorable was the metal John Deere pedal tractor I got as a kid. The whole damn thing was wrapped in brown paper bag and had enough tape on it to hold down an elephant. Years after he had passed my mother informed me that he was up all night putting the thing together to find out he left the chain off on the inside it by mistake. He had to unwrap the thing, take it apart and put it back together and rewrap. She said he got it under the tree about 5 minutes before I woke up. I would give back every single one of those gifts just to have one more time of seeing him wrap a gift in a paper sack.

the furshlugginer wrapping paper can cost as much as the gifts inside ... I've long had a very Scrooge-like attitude toward it ... I too have used the Sunday comics as wrapping paper and have yet to hear a complaint from anyone other than MrsS who says she thinks it a dumb idea ... apparently there's others out there who're not crazy about wrapping paper since colorful gift boxes are all the rage now as are colorful bags that one can get in sizes appropriate to the gift, both of which are readily re-useable ...

sudden thought ... consider the lyrics from the song "My Favorite Things" in "Sound of Music" ...

Raindrops on roses
And whiskers on kittens
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens
Brown paper packages tied up with strings
These are a few of my favorite things

Decorate the brown paper. Personalize it.

Carl, you can decorate my package with some of your work printouts.

Carl, that is rather cool. As you may have read, my year has had its sadness also. We are not going gaudy either. Plain silver or gold wrapping paper. One of moms favorite Christmas carols was Silver and Gold by Burl Ives.

Give the Mrs a box of crayons, sharpies, and pastels to create her own special touch to the gifts.

Great idea, besides, they will prolly look 100% better than what I can do with the best wrapping materials. I'd rather tale a whipping than wrap presents.

OTOH, ny wife is the Empresses of Christmas. Her wrapping, bow making and ribbon skills make people hesitant to even open the package, but it's something she enjoys doing.

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I just spray paint the boxes, saves time. Plus, you get a freebie high.

When you care to send the very best, say it with Krylon.

-Jesse

I agree with your wife... Christmas is about giving, caring, sharing and happy shiny presents under the tree. Nobody wants their tree looking like a dumpster station for UPS rejects.

Quit tighwadding out, you can re-wrap them all for less than one of your high end cigars you smoke in about the time it takes to smoke said high end cigar.

If you don't, the wife might make you wait till next year's solstice to practice your fertility rituals.

I'm sorry, but Christmas in NOT about shallow, materialistic shiny presents under a dead tree!

I disagree, I like the modern materialistic rendition of the ancient holiday of civilizations past.

It makes it fun.

Seriously though, if you don't re-wrap those presents, your wife will hold that sh1t against you forever.

Happy wife = happy life

Aren't you contradicting yourself? you're putting things in a package that could be construed as "shallow, materialistic" but are contained in a dreary package. The package doesn't make them less "shiny", the thought you put into them is what makes them less "materialistic shiny".
You might want to listen to your wife on this one

^ Yes, a bit contradicting. But I was never a big supporter of buying lots of presents at Christmas to begin with.
Prefer giving home-made breads, pastries, preserves, etc.

Goddammit...

I gotta agree with cacman again.

You may want to reconsider your stance...

Too wide?

Well, there were those three Wise Men bearing gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.


Allegorical in nature, the three gifts had a spiritual meaning: gold, symbolic of kingship on earth, frankincense (an incense) symbol of deity, and myrrh (an embalming oil) death.

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