How to Wrap a Gift (Neurotically)

For those of you who don't know, I am something of a gift-wrapping aficionado.  I worked in Borsheims' gift wrap department for the Christmas season my junior year in high school.  I only worked there for three months, but I wrapped enough gifts for it to become muscle memory.  Oddly enough, spending 8 hours at a time wrapping gifts never ruined it for me.  I love having the prettiest or best wrapped gifts at the party or under the tree.  The people at work tease me because I care that when we gift wrap something, it looks good.  I have been known to take a box from someone who's doing a bad wrapping job and redo it so it looks presentable.  With that said, I'm going to take full advantage of the "General Mayhem" part of the title of the blog and post something completely unrelated to anything but my life in general.

Gift wrapping is really easy if you know what you're doing, so I've made a step-by-step photo tutorial to show you how to do it.  Here goes...

First (obviously), gather your materials.  Scissors, gift wrap, bows, tape, etc.  Since this is how to wrap a gift (neurotically), I also absolutely recommend double sided tape.  It makes it so that you can use as much tape as your heart desires and no one will see it.  Unfortunately, I always seem to misplace my stash so I have to replace it every year, but such is life.

First, I generally use the flat side of a pair of scissors to beat the corners of the box down so that they don't rip the paper when you pull it taut. (I don't have any pictures of that because I hadn't come up with the brilliant idea for this tutorial yet when I *should* have done it.  Also, I forgot to do it.) Set the box face down on the wrapping paper and cut the paper so that it comes almost entirely up the side of the box you're wrapping.  This is very important for later on!

Fold one side of the paper over and tape it to the back of the box using the double stick tape. 

If the paper you're using has one side that's completely straight (like, it's the actual edge of the paper) you can skip this step.  Otherwise, fold the paper over so that you get a straight edge.  Tape the paper where you folded it.

Wrap the paper around the box and tape it in place.  (Also note the nice clean edge you get from folding the paper over. :D)

For the next few steps, I grabbed another box to work on because you really need a firm surface to work on.  (Normally I would use a table, but I was already very comfortable on the floor and I didn't want to move.) Flip the box over (right side up) and tape the paper down on one end

Turn the box on it's side and make a firm crease against the box for the side flap.  Repeat for the other side.

Set the box back right side up and fold each side flap, one at a time, against the box and tape it in place.  The tape should go at the very edge of the paper.  Repeat this for the other side of the box.

Pretty close up view!

Occasionally, you'll have a piece of paper sticking out on the bottom flap, like here.

Just fold it over so that the edge doesn't hang out. 

Put two pieces of tape coming up to the point, fold the flap up, and secure in place.

Measure out your ribbon and wrap it around the box with the top side down.  This way, you can use the ribbon you have to cover up the seam on the back of the box.  Wrap horizontally first, and then when you get to where the seam is, pull the ribbons against each other so they're going vertically and covering the seam.

Tie the pieces in a knot at the point where the horizontal and vertical pieces meet on the front of the gift.

Add fun curls to the ribbon!

Add a bow for good measure!

You can see more of what I was talking about where you pull the ribbons against each other to turn the other direction.  It works better if the ribbon is the same color on both sides, but I didn't have any other ribbon to work with, so this is how it ended up.

Also, if your paper doesn't come to an exact point on the ends, it looks much better if you fold it down so that the sides come to a point and the paper goes straight across.

So that is how you wrap a gift if you're as neurotic and as much of a perfectionist as me.  I think I did okay explaining the process, but if you have questions, I'm happy to answer them.  I love talking about gift wrapping (because I'm a nerd).

Anyway, I am super tired now and am thinking it's bed time!

Tschüss!