My family has always been pretty good at doing low-waste Christmas wrapping. My parents have a Rubbermaid bin full of gift bags and paper that we take turns squirrelling away to various corners of the house to wrap our family gifts.

At the end of the day, all of the bags and most of the paper go back in the bin to be used again next year.

When I was a newspaper reporter, I used to wrap all my gifts in old editions that had some of my holiday-themed photography on the cover. They looked great under the tree but my hands were COVERED in ink. You never really realize how much you unconsciously touch your face until you come away from your wrapping looking like a coal miner.

Inspired by Pinterest, this year I want to take my re-usable wrapping up a level using leftover fabric from my latest foray into making my own beeswax wraps.

I thought I’d try to make pretty drawstring bags, but then I came across Furoshiki wrapping on the One Million Women website. It’s so pretty (and cutting fabric into squares is so much easier than making bags), and I’m really pleased with how it turned out! Best of all, provided you can get your gift recipients on board, you can reuse the fabric wrap for years to come and divert tons of plastic/paper wrap from landfills. 

What are your zero waste gift wrap techniques? Let me know in the comments!