Christmas Gift Bags

It's an interesting phenomenon; I am recuperating from a nasty cold that D kindly shared with me, but I have little to no energy or even a desire to have energy.  And that sentence makes me wonder if anyone has ever complained about having a "nice" cold?  Oh well.  Because of this lingering malaise, I've been doing everything except what I should be doing.  Therefore, no news of paintings because I haven't painted except in class (and because the current painting is another secret project).  Nor have I returned to my major quilting project because I just don't have the oomph, a.k.a. energy.

Instead, I have returned to a whimsical project I started last year (?) or the year before.  I have been making Christmas gift bags from scraps of holiday fabrics (or that's the way it started; now I sometimes purchase that kind of fabric when it goes on sale).  My thinking was that we spend a lot of money on paper and ribbon that gets thrown away, and while much of that is biodegradable, some of it (foil paper and glittery/synthetic ribbon) may not be.  It also adds up to a lot of money over the years.  So I thought, why not make pretty fabric bags that can be re-used every year?

Of course, there are drawbacks.  Gift bags don't really work well for curious youngsters, that's for sure!  And if you are sending something to someone, can you ask them to return the bags?  No, I don't think so.  You might be able to explain why they have fabric wrapping and ask them to use them as part of their tradition, but . . .  It might not be appreciated.

Anyway, here are some of the ones I have made - partly just for fun.  In the first photo the one in the front is this year's, but the two in the back are not.

Older one in the front.

And this one (showing both sides) is new and is made from pieces intended for a Christmas table runner that was never made.  Those triangular bits were used in every bag I've done so far this year.

The others are similar. I take pieces all higglety-pigglety, square them up, add more fabric pieces to even things out, then put on the top cuff (with a channel for a ribbon to pull it close), and there you go.  Bob's your uncle!