Did you grow up saving wrapping paper?
I grew up rather poor, and one of the things I recall doing as a child was to carefully unwrap gifts so that we could re-use the wrapping paper. I am wondering how common a practice that is. To this day, I still carefully unwrap, even if I don't re-use, anymore...
by
drjing
asked 6 months ago
I have always taken great pride in my ability to destroy any and all wrapping paper within arm's reach. Paper, sacks, boxes, none are safe. It gets re-used, just in a recycling plant.
I save wrapping paper, but I never grew up.
I always unwrap gifts carefully and slowly, mostly because my sister is very much into the opposite (and it is my genetic and social responsibility as her older brother to lovingly and patiently annoy the crap out of her whenever possible), but also because I consider it a challenge to be able to rewrap a gift so that no one can tell that it was opened.
I've occasionally reused paper, when it was very fancy or unusual, and I know that my mother did this some when we were younger.
My parents had no need of a paper shredder with the 4 of us kids around. There was no way to reclaim wrapping paper on a gift given to any of us.
I did not grow up poor. At least I don't think so.
We lived with my grandparents, both Depression era kids, who saved, scrimped and hoarded.
My mom came from a family of just 6. Her sisters and brothers had 8, 9 and 13 kids, another was a nun. They continued a thrifty life style.
Dad was a polio survivor. He also learned to be very careful about doing things.
So we saved things. My first bike was a hand-me-down. And re-wrapping things in saved wrapping paper was fine. More often we cut up the really pretty paper and made it into art projects or decorated our books, dressers and more.
Why waste anything? BTW -- I may have picked up more than that. I have all my pay stubs going back to 1968 or 1969, whatever year I first filed my own taxes. Maybe that's not healthy?
We saved the bows, but not the paper. And recycling was still a futuristic concept.
However, I picked up on the habit of saving wrapping paper from my college roommate. She also taught me to wrap just the lid of the box, so boxes could be used over and over again. What a time saver! We have some very old boxes around, wrapped in some of my favorite-ever papers.
I saved all of my wrapping paper, bows and ribbons from my bridal showers and used the paper and bows to wrap gifts for my future sister-in-law and other soon-to-be family members. They seemed to be touched to get gifts wrapped in special paper (or maybe they cried because they thought their new relatives were just cheap?)
@tpscan: Gosh, maybe I am making an assumption here that you have been fairly steadily employed, but might this not be a fire hazard? :)
Didn't save and re-use paper unless it was really fancy paper like shiny foil or something, but we always saved bows, boxes and tissue paper. The same shirt boxes and the same bows still show up year after year at the family gathering. I still save boxes and bags but have quit saving bows because my wife prefers to tie her own bows.
@caron7: Actually it fits neatly into about 3-4 file boxes. The major receipts and bills pack down into a pretty thin folder. They get weeded down.
On the other hand, there are some things that don't fit into neat categories. Did I mention I also have computer equipment and Ham radio gear that goes back 30-40 years. That takes up far more space.
But I've been taking pictures for almost 50 years. My photo archives file a lot more space. Thank goodness for digital files that can pack 1,000s of photos on a tiny SD card. Now if I could just scan another 30 yrs of negatives I could reduce the volume to <5% of current volume.
@fleamarketadict: We did the exact same thing growing up. Didn't save the paper, but always saved the bows and tissue paper and boxes. Some of those same shirt-sized boxes and bows are STILL in my parents basement.
I only saved the ones that had some kind of sentimental value, or were really cool. I wouldn't reuse.
@djp519: I remember my mom saving bows and ribbons a lot :)
Yes we did, and I still do. I've saved swatches of neat birthday paper in my kids' baby books.
Large portions of gift wrap, yeah, they might be reused. From smaller items, no. Same with ribbon - long pieces, yes; short, no.
Boxes ... I think we still have some from the May Company and Broadway.
I grew up saving wrapping paper, boxes, and bows/ribbons. Still do sometimes, but I don't re-use it anymore... just leave the neatly folded pile until I forget about it/throw it away. I DO reuse the boxes and bows/ribbons though.
In my house, we used everything over & over & over again. My mother credits herself with being the original recycler.
P.S. Okay, maybe not everything...ugh.
My mom really is the only one concerned about it, especially the gift boxes. So while we unwrap presents we just throw the boxes, and wadded up wrapping paper balls at her.
Now that I think about it, that's kinda mean...hmmm
@tpscan: "I have all my pay stubs going back to 1968 or 1969, whatever year I first filed my own taxes. Maybe that's not healthy?"
I have almost all of my pay stubs for my current job (going back to 1986 or so, though I wasn't full-time until 1990). I was told to keep them, because NY State sometimes made mistakes and I might need them to prove sufficient time to retire.
Heck, I still save wrapping paper. Especially the shiny celophane stuff. Third generation from the depression and still cheap.
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