Monochrome wrapping

Last month I ordered a huge roll of brown kraft paper thinking I could use it to wrap not only Christmas gifts, but all gifts throughout the year. I'm so sick of buying gift bags for every birthday party the kids go to -- and there are a lot of them. Such a waste. Kraft paper gives us the opportunity to decorate the gifts according to recipient and have a little fun while we're at it. I envision coloring, stickers, potato stamping and more.

Over the summer I helped my mom clean out an old storage unit and came home with, literally, a truck load full of stuff (think garage sale Martha Stewart's house) including rolls and rolls of ribbon, which would go nicely on Christmas gifts. I fully intended to use said ribbon and kraft paper this holiday season...buuuuuuuut then I saw this blog post over on Design Mom with these photos~

~ from Summer Watkins of Style Me Pretty and fell immediately in love (with the packages and the blog).

As it so happens I had none of the supplies in those photos (drat!) but I did have a few creamy colored textiles to use instead. Here's what I ended up with for my first batch of gifts. These are being sent - hopefully today if I ever get out of the house - to family back east. I have a few more ideas up my sleeve for the packages staying here.

Okay, without further adieu...

They look so plain now that I see the photos next to Summer's. Hopefully the recipients will appreciate them though. They were fun to make and different from what I normally do.