The Art Of Christmas Wrapping.

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🎄🎁 Christmas wrapping. It’s the same every year, isn’t it. You spend eleven months not thinking about Sellotape, then suddenly December hits and you’re living in a world where nothing exists except Sellotape. You’re basically a hostage to it. You can’t find the end of the roll, you’re spinning it round like you’re trying to crack a safe. “Is that it? No… is that it? No…” By the time you’ve found the end, it’s folded over on itself like a tiny little origami nightmare. You peel it back and it rips, and now you’ve got a strip of tape that’s basically decorative. Useless. Might as well frame it.

And the wrapping paper! Who decided wrapping paper should be thinner than a communion wafer? You so much as look at it and it tears. You try to wrap something with corners — God forbid — and suddenly you’re performing emergency surgery. “Nurse, more paper! We’re losing him!” You’re patching it up with little squares like you’re tiling a bathroom. And you always get that one roll that lies to you. Looks massive. You think, “Oh, that’ll do loads.” You get home, open it up  it’s basically a bookmark. You could wrap a KitKat with it. A fun‑size KitKat.

Then there’s the presents that come in stupid shapes. Why can’t everything be a box? Why are we wrapping balls? Why are we wrapping teddy bears? Why are we wrapping bicycles? You see people trying to disguise a bike. “Oh, I’ll just put a bow on it.” Yeah, Sheila, because nothing says mystery like a six‑foot object shaped exactly like a bike. “Ooh, I wonder what it could be?” It’s either a bike or a very optimistic trombone.

And you always get that one person who’s too good at wrapping. You know the type. Corners sharp enough to slice bread. Ribbon curled like it’s been professionally trained. They hand you a present and you feel bad opening it. “Oh no, I can’t ruin this. This is art, this.” Meanwhile, yours looks like you wrapped it using your feet. In the dark. During an earthquake.

Gift tags! Another scam. You buy a pack of 40 and use three. The rest go in the drawer of doom. Everyone’s got one  that drawer full of batteries, takeaway menus, a screwdriver that doesn’t fit anything, and 37 unused gift tags from 2009. You open it and it’s like a time capsule of disappointment.

And don’t get me started on the “special” wrapping paper. Foil paper. Glitter paper. Paper so thick it’s basically carpet underlay. You try to fold it and it just springs back open like it’s resisting you. “No. I refuse. I will not become a present.” You’re wrestling with it like you’re on Gladiators. Wolf’s in the corner cheering you on.

Then there’s the moment  the moment every household has  where someone shouts, “Where are the scissors?” And suddenly it’s a national emergency. Everyone’s searching. You’re checking under cushions, behind the telly, in the fridge you don’t know. You’re desperate. And when you finally find them, they’re the bluntest scissors known to mankind. They don’t cut; they chew. You’re sawing through paper like you’re cutting through a steak. Sparks flying.

And after all that  the tape, the paper, the wrestling match with the foil roll  you hand the present over on Christmas morning, and what happens? They tear it open in three seconds. Three seconds! Hours of your life gone. “Oh, thanks!” they say, chucking the paper on the floor like it’s nothing. You’re stood there thinking, “I could’ve wrapped that in a bin bag. Same effect.”

But that’s Christmas, isn’t it. Stress, chaos, glitter in places glitter should never be  and somehow, we love it. Because when it’s all done, and the presents are under the tree, and the lights are twinkling, you look at your handywork and think, “Yeah. That’ll do.” Even if half of them look like they’ve been wrapped by a drunk octopus. 🎁🎄


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