{create} sparkly gift tags

Three days till Christmas! As if you needed another reminder. :) I hope all your plans and gift-buying/wrapping is coming together well. I have a couple things before we get into the fun and quick Christmas craft of the day.

First, if you haven't already, don't forget to enter the contest for a great daily planner! The contest closes tomorrow, with a winner announced Friday morning.

Second, I realized I haven't shown you our Christmas decor yet. Because we don't do a lot of decorating and because I'm sure you're a little burnt out of Christmas decor by now, I'll just show you a quick couple pics.

A few touches of red, silver and white really set the tone and add a lot of festive-ness to our little house this time of year. 

So, we're pretty much down to the wire now, and for many that means it's time to wrap gifts! I like to add a little extra something to personalize the outside of my gifts each year. Last year, it was cute, personalized candy-filled bags. This year, I went a little simpler. Our Christmas party has me candied and baked out. Somewhere (Land of Nod, maybe?) I'd seen cute letter gift tags. So, I created letters, with my own twist of course.

My standard wrapping, for all holidays and occasions, is kraft paper, covered by a strip of cute fun paper, and ribbon. I think the sparkly letter adds a really fun and special element.

These took me all of five minutes to make. 1. Print oversized letters from whichever font you like. I think this is either Times or Garamond. I like the serifs. 2. Trace backwards onto the back of your silver paper (yes, this picture doesn't show backwards. Oops!). 3. The silver paper I used is standard weight paper, so I followed steps 1 and 2 with a thin cardboard gift box also. I think the kraft-color box really ties all the gift wrap elements together. 4. Glue the sparkly letter to the kraft letter and attached to the package!

Another fun gift wrapping trick? Paper actually makes great ribbon! I use it all the time to get fun colors and patterns on my packages. Simply cut a thin strip, and curl with scissors as you would a ribbon. It makes a nice loose curl.

The paper ribbon is easily attached with a cloth ribbon. The letter can be hole-punched and tied into the other ribbon. Actually, these would also make cute ornaments after the gift is open.

So, friends, what are some of your gift wrapping tips and techniques? I would love ideas as I tackle the remaining stack of gifts I need to wrap!