Reusable Christmas-Gift Sacks will Make Your Holiday Eco-Friendly

This year, make your Christmas an eco-friendly one by avoiding the use of rolls and rolls of wrapping paper. You can make your own super-simple Christmas gift sacks that will help the environment and save you a pretty penny in the long run! And they are just as festive as traditional wrappings!

Gift sacks are made of cloth, with a drawstring that allows them to be easily opened and shut and they are fully reusable. If you use them to give gifts to people outside the immediate family, you'll be passing on the green spirit, since they can then turn around and use the gift sacks themselves the following year!

It usually helps to buy the gifts first, so you know what size gift sacks to make. Once you have the gifts, get your fabric ready. While you can use any fabric you like, for a truly festive feeling, go for some Christmas-themed cloth. If you are really thrifty, buy the holiday fabric on sale after the holidays! You can get everything from Santa prints to holly and mistletoe, or, for a more elegant look, go with green and white stripes or even solid colors. Metallic threads in the fabric add an especially festive flair.

All you need to do is wrap the fabric around your gift to measure it, just like you would with wrapping paper. You want the fabric to overlap at least an inch around and two at the bottom. Cut it so the fabric is three or four inches taller than the gift at the top, giving it enough space for the bag to be pulled closed and hide the present. You should have a large (or small, depending on the gift) rectangle of cloth now that can easily be sewn into an eco-friendly Christmas gift sack.

To sew, begin by folding the fabric in half horizontally, with the nice sides of the fabric together. Sew with a ¼" seam allowance from the top, down the side and across the bottom. Now you're ready to do the top of the bag.

First, hem the fabric by folding the top half inch over to the wrong side of the fabric and sew this. Then fold the top inch over and sew it again, keeping close to the bottom edge. This will give you a tube through which to thread the drawstring, which can be anything from simple string to fancy cords or even ribbon. Cut a slit in the tube at the front of the bag for the drawstring to go through.

Cut a length of your chosen drawstring material. It should be long enough to go around the entire bag and still have at least a foot left over. Tie it to a safety pin on one end and push this end into the hole, working the pin through the tube until it comes out the other side. Tie a knot or bead into each end of the drawstring and you are finished your bag!

If you are feeling rather crafty, why not add some embroidery or appliqué to make your gift sacks extra special? After all, they'll last for a very long time! If you ever have a gift that doesn't fit any of the existing sacks, just whip up a new one. They literally take less than half an hour to make!