How To Host a Ladies Wrap Party!

At 3:30am on Christmas Day last year, I vowed to never wait until Christmas Eve to wrap gifts again. I wrapped for hours and hours and hours and HOURS. It was terrible.

Someone said to me, why did you buy so many gifts? Well…I love to give gifts. But honestly it’s hard to cut down a list that includes parents, grandparents, kids, cousins, nieces & nephews, in-laws, teachers, friends, coworkers…the list goes on and on!

So this year in attempt to keep my pact with myself, I planned a ladies wrap night. I have a fun group of girlfriends who regularly “lunch” but this time we’d be getting together in the evening, in our cozies, and wrapping!

If you don’t have time to host a holiday party or meet friends for dinner, this is the perfect excuse to get together while tackling your Christmas wrapping!

For an event like a casual wrap party, there is no need for a printed invitation. I was thrilled to custom create a darling digital invite through Minted (who will be launching digital invitations in January) that was emailed to each of my girlfriends.

To make the night simple and eliminate extra work, I asked each friend to bring their favorite cheese, cracker or bread.  I used to do all the work myself but recently started taking friends up on their offer to bring things.  You should too!  When everyone arrived, we made charcuteries with all the goodies.

When planning what drinks to serve, keep it simple! With a small group, choose one or two beverages or cocktails.  We made moscow mules and sparkling berry spritzers garnished with fresh raspberries.

Give your friends ample notice about your wrap party. You’ll want to allow them time to Christmas shop so they have things to wrap! My girlfriends were excited to shop early and check things off their busy December list.

In preparation for the party, I made personalized gift tags and wrap at for each friend. Kind of like a party favor!

Make sure you have a large assortment of boxes on hand for gifts (why can’t every store just give you box??!!) and plenty of ribbon to dress each package. I found every size, shape and color box at Nashville Wraps!

We were giddy to start wrapping our packages. I’m absolutely crazy for my personalized paper, it’s so thick and well made. I couldn’t decide which paper I liked best so I ordered 4 or 5 different patterns. I think they all blend well under my tree!

One gift I’ll be giving this year is kid art! I’m thrilled to have tried Minted’s Personalized Kid Art design process. It’s so simple, you upload a photo of your child’s drawing (it can be from your smart phone) and Minted turns it into a work of art! I turned my daughter Ally’s drawing into a gold foiled piece and my son Hudson’s into a navy blue letterpress print. They make such a special gift!

Aren’t these amazing?! Such a keepsake!

I love giving a gift that has some thought behind it rather than just picking up something generic or even worse, a gift card.  Minted also has gorgeous art for just about anyone on your list.  I found the cutest foil-pressed print of a map of Seattle and this adorable birthstone art print for someone special born in June!

By the end of the night we had each accomplished a pretty good pile of gifts and felt great marking a holiday to-do off our list, weeks in advance! It was so much fun to host a wrap party, I’ll definitely be doing this again next year!

 

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Photography by Laura Marchbanks