'He who has Christmas in his heart will find Christmas under the tree.' Anon.

And so it is nearly Christmas.......From now until Christmas I will share my creative and green festive ideas with you on a daily basis. There are so many, I could write all day....then I would have a book. ( Maybe an idea???)

Today I will start with one of my favourite green gift wrapping ideas. Something that I have shared with you before, but extra special during the festive season because one can really 'get festive' with it. It is wrapping will dried herbs , tissue paper and cellophane. I am reminding  you about this now so that you can collect and dry your herbs and flowers in time for the festive gift wrapping rush!

Collect  fragrant herbs such as rosemary, mint, lavender, rose petals, lemon verbena and whatever you can find. Dry on open trays or on decorative platters where the petals and leaves become a fragrant  feature in your home.

Dry herbs and petals on flat platters or baskets.

To complete your collection of materials for this gift wrapping exercise you will also need to collect tissue paper, cellophane and ribbon or lace. Here again, you can recycle tissue paper, cellophane and ribbon. Should you need to remove a few crinkles in the tissue paper,  simply iron with a warm iron. Best done between sheets of brown paper. Iron your lace and fabric ribbon as well.

Personalise your gift wrapping process with a unique selection of dried herbs.

Here, you can see how I have sandwiched the dried petals between the layer of cellophane and tissue paper. It is absolutely a unique gift wrapping process which will be appreciated by the recipient of the gift.

It is not WHAT you give, but HOW you give that is most important!

Yes, it is newspaper!

My next secret for green gift wrapping is quite simply a piece of newspaper or a colourful flyer. No excuse for never being able to wrap a gift at any time of the year. Once again, use recycled ribbon or lace and you will be able to hand over a perfectly presented gift.

Fresh from the garden, a fragrant tussie mussie.

When one has herbs growing in one's garden, gifts from nature will always be abundant.Create floral posies or tussie mussie's for instant gifts, wrap in generous layers of cellophane and finish off with raffia, ribbon or lace.
So, go ahead and prepare yourself for the festive season....the green way!

Decorate your cellophane with decorative ladybirds.