And gift bags also silence the Grandmother ghosts who insist that we carefully unwrap the presents and save the wrapping paper to be used next year.

For those of you who are using gift bags and want the tissue to look really nifty and Martha-Stewart-y finished (trust me, I used to work at a gift bag and tissue manufacturer):

Get gift bag.
Place gift in gift bag. Push gift bag aside for now.
Lay out sheets of tissue paper on a flat surface.
With your left hand, make the "OK" sign. Lay your hand on top of the tissue, and pull tissue through the "hole" of the OK. Stop when you get half the tissue through the hole.
Pop the tissue, pointy-side down, in the gift bag, so that the tissue has all sorts of exotic peaks as shown here.

You might need to do this twice to fill the top of the bag.

Wrapping is a physical skill; I know all these principles, but my results aren't consistently terribly good.

When I saw Santa trying to tear strips of tape off one of those little hand dispensers, I understood your remarks about pre-cutting tape. I just use an office tape dispenser, I can tear off a piece of tape nearly as easily as grabbing a pre-cut piece. Surely most of us have had enough companies and conventions shot out from under us to have office tape dispensers around the house?

Or if you run across a batch of inexpensive (or on-sale) kitchen towels (I prefer the all-cotton kind, truly absorbent and with nothing painted on them to disrupt absorbency), purchase them and keep on hand as useful gift wrap.

All of them look varying degrees of 'interesting,' except for one that almost sort of worked.

I need to find a video or a class or something. I've seen it done so often at department stores and I just want all my presents to look that good.

The bags themselves are useful. Once the treats are gone, they can be filled with pennies and used as a cosh.

My grandmother insisted that the latter was a bad idea, because the paper was full of toxic lead. Which it might have been, decades earlier.

1. I'm guessing "swip" was a typo for "swipe," but "swip" is more onomatopoeic so I'm treating it as a coinage. The OED says "swip" does have two archaic meanings: "a stroke or blow" or to "strike, hit, smite" - or, to "forcibly wield a weapon, especially in a downward direction." I know some people I'd like to give a swip. (After which I'd give them the slip.) It's also short for Society for Women in Philosophy.

2. "Wily old wrappers" called up a mind picture of Flavor Flav in his Viking hat, pretending to be insane.

*sigh* This is what happens when I'm home from work early waiting for the cable guy.

And is a practical use for pennies. Beats my pickle jar solution.

The ink on wrapping paper is full of nasty things: you don't want to burn it around people. (If you consider yourself an environmentalist, you probably don't want to buy it, either.)

Then I carry my loot home in the same bags. And reuse them next year.

Although this year I have the distinct impression I'm giving people bags I've given them before. Just can't win.

Sorry I'm being a grinch. It's just, well, dioxins.

Add to the ordinary dioxin-load (a lot less than it used to be, but, still...) whatever heavy-metals are present in the fancy wrapping papers (often cadmium, and sometimes, yes, lead), and burning it in the fireplace really IS a bad idea.

(Shorter answer: Your grandmother was right.)

Also for gift tags, cutting up the old Christmas cards a few days after Christmas is surprisingly therapeutic and yields a nice pile of unique tags.

1. Wind two or three layers of paper around the cylindrical box, leaving a truly obscene amount of paper overhanging the ends (i.e., 1.5 times the cylinder length on each end). Tuck the edge of the paper under and secure with a wee bit of tape.

2. Carefully gather up at the paper on each end, pleating as you go. Give it a twist, and wind some tape around to hold it.

3. Wind some ribbon around the tape at the gathered ends and tie it off. This is just to hide the tape because it looks ugly.

4. Fluff out the pleated gathers at each end and trim if necessary.

Gigantic Christmas crackers!

I imagine you could make enormous hard candies using shoe boxes and a bit more care.

But I had a fabric stash, and way too many baskets: All the goodies got tied with green ribbon, and placed into a green basket. I wrapped the green basket full o'goodies in white tulle (I don't know what the tulle's original purpose had been, but it was in the fabric basket), tied the entire thing with more green ribbon, and some strips of green silk, and received stunned and admiring ooohs and aaaahs when I finally got to the shower.

Which supports the "go bold" axiom. Fudge like you meant it, and always have something useful on hand.

Somewhere I found some "florist foil" a few years ago. It's red on one side, silver on the other, with a pretty texture. Tape adheres to it, but it will also help hold itself in place (once it's bent, it's bent, and the texture keeps "unbends" from being visible). You can wrap some packages in red, some in silver, fold back bits for contrast... I adore this stuff.

She brightened right up at the idea of such recycling.

It's also fun to look at a package and try to figure out where in the country this particular quadrangle is from

Let the bookbinder do it. She's good with paper.

Just finishing off four hours of wrapping. Foil papers this year, and minimal ribbons. Metallic pens and gift tags in roughly even proportions for addressing.

Time for bed.

The web knows all, but does not tell all. The fluorosphere knows all and explains it with diagrams.

[Cheerfully pulls out accumulated ribbons, shinies, and box of 'things that stick things together']

All hail Super 77!

But really, for packages? 3M Repositionable Spray Adhesive 75.

Note: 3M Hi-Strength Spray Adhesive 90 is not joking. Unless your goal is, well, lamination, it is the wrong answer here, and for that matter, in most circumstances where "spray" is involved. Seriously look at your commitment to motion before you wildly crank off a can of 90.

To quote Elwood. "This is glue...Strong Stuff!"

...It was wrapped in a single sheet of handmade paper, dark gray, folded and tucked in that mysterious Japanese way that required neither glue nor string, but she knew that once she'd opened it, she'd never get it folded again.

Speaking of fumblefingers, the last thing you want to do is break the gift, which Santa Bush apparently forgot: He broke it. Santa Bush and the Christmas Barn Rules: He'll fix it, sort of. Oh oh oh. (Photo)

... er ... and remember the stuff travels. Get your laptop/computer out of the way, or use the spray (or the computer) in a cardboard box. The cleanup sucked.

...It was wrapped in a single sheet of handmade paper, dark gray, folded and tucked in that mysterious Japanese way that required neither glue nor string, but she knew that once she'd opened it, she'd never get it folded again.

If so, did you have any more luck than I ever did finding a way to accomplish this? It sounds so plausible and so elegant. He might have made it up from whole cloth, but doggone it, this is something that ought to exist. Every year I seem to waste a few sheets of gift wrap thinking "This time I've got the answer," but so far I've never been right. Somewhere in the vast collected memory banks of the flourosphere, does there exist a pointer to this particular bit of (possibly fictitious) knowledge? I'd sure appreciate any hint that anyone could share.

It isn't made up whole cloth at all. It's very common, in fact; there are books and books that describe how to do that sort of thing ... Try this link as a starter in english.

Something that we can take advantage of around here for wrapping paper is the USGS annual outdated-topographic-map giveaway. They advertise in the local papers...

Where? WHERE?? (I assume DC? And when?)

Plus of course, the 6 laws of why one must keep your scissors sharp and what to do if you cut off your arm whilst trimming ribbon.

I just wrapped about a third of my packages tonight. I never wrap the big ones for the household/family, I just hide them until "Santa" comes. (me--always) Is there anyway I can find someone else to do that job? And then when do I get a gift? Actually my family is getting better about getting me something. I mean I love the job, but there have been Christmases that I wondered if I was loved.

I really like gift bags and alternative wrapping because I feel that they are so much less wasteful. I had a great-aunt who always wrapped our gifts in the Sunday funnies. I did it for a few years, but now I read most of my funnies online.

Oh, and we got a gift basket of nuts from my sister-in-law from Cherry Valley Farms, an on-line store. It was such a rip off ($9 worth of goodies for $39) and to add insult to injury the Easter grass they packed it in stunk to high heaven. I tore out the grass, threw it away and put the usable parts on the porch to air out.

A local store offers, in its advertising circular, pre-wrapped gifts.

Inside the bland blue wrappers are the small, generic, somewhat useful items meant to be given to co-workers, in-laws you know almost nothing about, and Silent Santa recipients.

The one thing items like that have in their favor is that they can be regifted easily.

True Story:

Many years ago, I recieved from my manager a ice scraper . . . an illuminated ice scraper. It had the look of something grabbed off of an "executive gifts" shelf, but its-the-thought-that- counts. (By contrast, what my manager and other co-workers got from me. Oh Dear God, look at what it is worth now!)

Now, for many years, one of the common "stocking stuffer" items in my family was an ice scraper, or a ice scraper / brush combination. As a result, I had two or three of them. "Mom," I told me mom, "I now have three more ice scrapers than I need. Please take this unopened gadget and put it in your pile of emergency gifts."

Four years later, the illuminated scraper's provenance had been forgotten, and I got it back, as a Christmas present. Resigned, I kept it. I finally got rid of it by giving it to some distressed fellow CMU students living in my apartment complex. They were from a warmer clime, and had no idea how to handle the sheet of ice on the windshield. Never saw them again. I hope they got many years of service from it.

Mama and I were wrapping presents upstairs one year, and there was a sudden commotion downstairs, so I got up with my bare feet to find out what was going on. A lot of hydrogen peroxide and a few butterfly bandages later, there was a new house rule: No Tape Dispensers on the Floor.

One of the screwier gifts I ever got was a small metal box full of what I decided were oversized ball bearings. It was nicely wrapped up, but I hadn't a clue what I was supposed to do with them; I put them to one side and continued being Santa that morning.

At the end of the present-opening orgy I was advised to look behind the chair I was sitting in. I did, and pulled out a 1 1/2-foot x 2 1/2-foot pachinko game.

Not to mention advice on the proper place to put emergency medical information while wrapping gifts, the correct way to use different types of paper as temporary bandages, and how to assemble a gift-wrap jump bag so you can respond quickly to emergency package concealment needs outside the home.

Oh, and one or two gruesome tales of mishaps that befell people who made poor pre-wrap decisions.

For the same price, as far as wrapping small gifts is concerned, some inexpensive colored art paper can be acquired. The edges round instead of warping; the paper holds firm. It makes gifts look subtly classy. You can get a single piece of fine handmade paper, cut out geometric shapes, and glue them to the top of the package for tags. You can also roll corners in the art paper and create interesting shapes that would not hold with wrapping paper.

The year after I took a book arts class, I was broke for the holidays, so my newfound knowledge of paper came in handy. I gave people tiny cheap trinkets and wrapped them in fancy, absurd configurations. Nobody minded; they had enough fun opening the present that the fun quotient of receiving it was upped, so when tiny glass animals or single bars of chocolate came out, it still added up to a good present.

No, not DC. Menlo Park, California (30 miles south of San Francisco). Here's an old article about their maps giveaway in 1999.

Not unless you're unbearably soft-spoken. Once I saw an episode where the guest was Patricia Arquette, and I like Patricia Arquette, but after about five minutes I started screaming, "Change your tone of voice once in a while! Raise your voice! I can't stand your even tones!"

Ahem.

And Chryss at #5: Tin foil! Genius! That's what I'm doing. Problem solved. Thanks.

There's certainly a time for the beautifully wrapped box, but in my house, that time is not Christmas.

I took the very worst of it, the ones where the manufacturer made it stay in a roll by glueing it so that it tears when you unroll it. These I tore a little more, then scrunched them up and unfolded them again.

I used the result to wrap (in a slipshod manner) two identical squeaky toys, and labelled each with the name of one of my parents' dogs, who destroy everything they can get their paws and teeth on. I think my parents will be amused.

I plan to blame it on my cats. One of them does actually go after anything with tape on it, so it's believable. (The best was when I taped a note to a houseguest at eye-height on the bathroom door, or almost five and a half feet up. I watched the cat in question stare up at it from directly below, then sproing five and a half feet straight up in the air and claw at the tape.)

#48 Madeleine Robins, and #50 A.J. Luxton: My boyfriend, a graphic designer who excelled at book arts while in school, has not yet wrapped his gifts. I weep to think how mine will look beside his.

It would never have occurred to me that simple rectilinear wrapping was such an Issue!

I got hooked on origami when I was 10 (Robert Harbin's book with boustidistros [spelled wrong, I'm sure] illustrations). It turned out to be vitally useful in Navy boot camp, where total worldly possessions were in a cubic locker not more than two feet across with each individual item of clothing folded in its own official way. I was in such great demand as a folder that I escaped more mundane duties.
My idea of challenging is full, formal noshi.

Also, in years where presents from me will live for a few days in a multi-colored chaotic pile of presents from many other people, I've wrapped with an eye toward the overall effect: using all white paper, or brown kraft paper, for little islands of similarity to scatter throughout. Really helps tie the pile together.

Gift tags: I buy cheap paperbacks from the buck-a-copy stack, drill holes in the upper left corner, and tie them on with twine. The fun of course lies in overtones ironic or otherwise with gift or recipient. —One year, the tag ended up a better present than the gift. ("I read this when I was eight! I've never seen it since!")

But to my mind, nothing tops the legendary mad wrapping skillz of Barry "Ampersand" Deutsch in his youth: a present wrapped in green glass bottles held together with clear tape. A present wrapped in dirty socks. A present in a bottle, something too large for the neck swaddled in newspaper inside a 2-liter pop bottle. The sheet stapled ominously to the ceiling, with a bit of rope dangling down; I was told to yank on it. I did. A Peter Beagle book tumbled onto my head. (We never did get the security deposit back on that place.)

As for wrapping, one inexpensive wrap I found this year is paper with a metallic sheen and lots of stripes in various Xmassy colors and different widths. Put a vertical layer over horizontal for some visual interest, or roll a thin strip diagonally to make nifty slender tubes that can be crossed on top and anchored with a ready-made bow. Not professional-quality wrapping, but fun.

Brown paper grocery bags. Turn inside out so the advertising doesn't show. For larger gifts, tape together as needed.

Bind the whole thing up with copious amounts of duct tape in lieu of ribbon.

Break out the Sharpies and draw all over the duct tape (and, if the paper bag is the heavy sort, the paper too. Or use washable markers on the paper. Sharpies soak through thin paper.)

Somewhere on the package, write "CHEAP ASS HIPPIE GIFT WRAP" or some appropriate variation

I gave a good buddy a wedding gift wrapped this way. This year, it's my FILs turn for the CHEAP ASS HIPPIE VACATION PACKAGE.

(Doesn't hurt that I'm known far and wide as both a cheap-ass and a weirdo. I value my reputation highly.)

1) Control bleeding (direct pressure, elevation, pressure points).
2) Treat for shock (wrap patient in blankets (festive ribbon and bow are optional but appreciated), elevate feet, provide oxygen (if available).
3) Wrap amputated arm in clean fabric (festive holiday design optional but appreciated), place in plastic bag, place on ice. (Do not get arm wet or put in direct contact with ice.)
4) Transport arm in the same ambulance with the patient (note: do not delay transport while searching for the arm).

One year, though, he got bored with all of the tin foil, went to our local Chinese food takeaway joint, and bought a bunch of unused Chinese takeout boxes. Gifts were then dumped in those, with a bow stuck on top.

Another holiday tradition: gifts from the pets were always socks and underwear. The "reason" given was that, hey, they're dogs/cats/ducks, they don't know any better, give 'em a break, and you could use the socks and the underwear, right?

Nothing makes you miss your own family for the holidays quite like spending your first holiday away. My first Christmas with my in-laws is now legendary, because I came away SHELL-SHOCKED. But that's a long-ass story for another time.

New holiday tradition: watching Santa Clause vs. the Martians, MST3K version, and also the "Holiday Cocktail Party" episode of Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee where she debuted a "Cocktail Tree." It's not really a tree, it's more of a cry for help. Trust me.

Also, no instructions, but a lovely gallery of various origami containers and other objects. (Click on "Fabric Origami" to see the gallery.)

It wasn't pretty.