Gift bags, wrapping paper, tissue paper, ribbons, bows, greeting cards and other gift giving items can all be reused when packaging gifts for others. This not only saves you money but it is good for the environment. It is estimated that Americans spend more than $12.7 billion on wrapping paper annually and almost all of it is thrown away after one use. 2.3 million pounds ends up in our nation’s landfills. And those are just the statistics for wrapping paper. Gift bags, ribbons, bows and greeting cards also contribute to our overflowing piles of waste.

Gift Bags, Wrapping Paper and Tissue Paper

You can use a tote or any type of container you like to store the gift packaging items, place scotch tape, scissors, pens, and markers in the same container so that they are easily accessible when you are packaging a gift.

Fold the gift bags and remove any used tags before storing them, you can organize them by occasion, size and color.

When unwrapping a gift do it carefully so that you don’t damage the wrapping paper. Remove any tape and fold the paper neatly to store it, if the paper is crumpled, you can use an iron to smooth it out. Lay a towel on an ironing board, place the wrapping paper on the towel and smooth it out, then place a second towel on top of the wrapping paper. Use an iron on the lowest setting and iron over the top towel. This will remove any wrinkles so that you can fold the paper and use it again. If you don’t have an iron, you can place the paper between two towels and cover it with something heavy like books or boxes to smooth out the wrinkles. Tissue paper can also be used again and treated the same as wrapping paper to remove any wrinkles. Fold it neatly and organize it by color.

Bows & Ribbon

Straighten out ribbons and roll them up to store them, bows can be attached to a new gift using scotch tape or glue.

Greeting Cards

You can reuse greeting cards in several ways. If there is very little writing on the card you can cover it with a label or sticker so that the card can be reused, you can also cut off the front of the card and use it as a postcard, write a nice note and send it to a friend or relative, or cut off the front of the card and fold it in half to create a new, smaller card or use it as a note card.

You can cut the front of the card that contains the picture into smaller pieces, punch a hole in each piece, attach a ribbon and use them as gift tags.