It’s Christmas time, and I’ve been thinking about how to reduce waste this Chrissy. So I decided to make DIY Christmas Gift Bags. I have so many brown paper bags left over from our food shopping. I thought rather than going out and buying wrapping paper, I would try and up-cycle the humble paper bag.
I chose to decorate the bags using cookie cutters. This is a nice and easy option for little ones to join in. It makes stencilling really simple. If your kids are very little, you might want to do the tracing, and they could paint them up. If your kids are older, then they could make even more sophisticated patterns with the cookie cutters, than my example below.
And once you’ve made your gift bags you can make some sugar cookie gifts to go in them!
And, of course, if you don’t have Christmas themed cookie cutters, you can definitely freestyle these easily, or use different shapes from household objects.
However you approach it, just make sure you’re all having fun!
DIY Christmas Gift Bag
What you need
A humble brown paper bag 🙂
Resene test pots in Candy Floss, Energy Yellow and Kermit
A paint brush
Christmas cookie cutters
A white, gold and pink paint pen, or white gel pens
A black Sharpie
A pencil
What to do
1. Chose what shapes you want to use from your Christmas cookie cutters, and trace around them all over the bag. I chose a bell, a Christmas tree and a candy cane
2. Once you’ve drawn all your shapes on it is time to paint them. I started by painting all the candy canes with Resene Candy Floss. I did the candy canes first so that by the time I had finished painting all the other shapes they would be dry to add in the detail.
3. Continue by painting the trees. I did mine in Resene Kermit. And finally, add in the Bells in Resene Energy Yellow.
4. Your candy canes should be dry by now, so grab your white pen and add in all the white lines, then outline them with your black Sharpie.
5. Grab your pink and Gold pens, and draw some Christmas decorations onto your trees, then outline in black.
6. Outline your yellow bells with the black Sharpie too.
7. Repeat all the steps on the other side of your gift bag, pop in a gift, and place under the Christmas tree!
Happy Christmas everyone out there. Stay safe, love those around you, and enjoy those little moments in life.
Check out our Arts and crafts section for hundreds more crafty ideas.
