Birthdays and Turkeys and Gifts, Oh My!

I got halfway through a tutorial tonight and then...my sewing machine broke. And I tried very hard to fix it myself, but as it happens, I don't actually know what I'm doing when it comes to using miniature screwdrivers. That's now on my list of skills to learn.

This is my FAVORITE time of year by far. I am so excited. Went shopping today and there was Christmas everywhere! I love November and December more than any other months. In November, it's my birthday (next Tuesday, if anyone feels like sending me refashion tools as a present!), and then I get to bake like crazy for Thanksgiving. December rolls around, and once finals are over, it's all about sweets, family, parties with friends, wrapping presents, opening them...

Wrapping presents is my favorite part of Christmas. I'm SUCH a perfectionist about my wrapping. Actually, both Elizabeth and I were. We had a fairly long discussion about it just last week.

I am spending unreasonable amounts of time looking at ways to re-use other materials to wrap my presents this year. Writing Sew My Soul has really ignited my "go green" fire.

Two years ago for my brother's birthday, I used up the comics section of the Sunday paper to wrap his present. He is a huge graphic novel fan, so he thought it was great. I made tiny strips of the paper into a huge bow, too. I wish I had pictures!

Last year, I took really old shopping tags I found in an attic of a historic building in town and made gift tags from them. Each one was rimmed with gold, thin strips of ribbon made different borders, and I wrote messages on each one. I even shipped one package overseas and I'm pretty sure I wrapped the entire interior of the package and each item I had put in it. I really do spend TONS of time on this every year.

This year's presents are going to have special present toppers. I'm not sure how I'm going to make them yet, but they're going to be amazing.

How do you like to wrap your presents?