Craft Alert: Lock Up Your Cupcake Liners!

IMG_3169
Red gift back with silver and white cupcake liner bow, Photo and bow by Cecilia Kennedy

High alerts went out on the neighborhood Facebook page when rumors spread that I was looking for cupcake holders—and I wouldn’t be using them the way they were intended to be used. Through the power of adhesive tape, an HGTV video, and sheer force, these cupcake holders would never be the same. They would be added to a gift-wrapping first-aid kit, clearly marked with the words, “Break in case of a bow shortage.”

Since I have to check Facebook daily to find out if I made it onto the neighborhood naughty list for some reason buried in paragraph 5,945 of the homeowners’ association manual, I am treacherously exposed to distracting videos and advertisements. As a result, I can’t always finish my work on time and I run into crafts projects I just “have to try.” This link here, from HGTV was too tempting for me to ignore, so I’m sharing it now with you so that you can be haunted by it as well. In all honesty, I really enjoyed this project. It took all of five minutes tops—and I didn’t even follow the directions that well. I just got the “gist” and went with it. The idea is pure genius, so I’m re-creating the scenario from which this invention was probably born:

Exhausted Gift Wrapper: I’m pretty sure there are bows and wrapping paper shoved in the closet somewhere. . . . Ah. . . here we go: Wrapping paper, dribs and drabs of clear tape, some old shoeboxes, shreds of curly tape, and . . . oh no! No! There are no bows! Okay, don’t panic—just print off pictures of bows from the Internet and tape them to the presents. . . That’s it. . . nice and easy. . . no one will know.

Except: The HGTV people said, “No! Don’t print off pictures of bows! Use cupcake liners!” And it works—it really, really works.

This year, with these bows, I think I can place more professional-looking wrapped gifts under the tree. Usually, they look like Krampus challenged me to an eggnog drinking contest and then we’d wrestle—and I’d win, but the presents—all wonky and battered—would bear the scars. All these years, they’ve been screaming and crying inside—begging me to just raid the pantry. “The cupcake liners are next to the corn!” they were saying, “Next to the canned corn!”

In Other News: I have two more short stories that were accepted in literary magazines!  This first one is called “On the Downbeat” and it’s about a narrator’s obsession with a song. The link is here: “On the Downbeat.” This next one is in print only. Open Minds Quarterly, a magazine that raises awareness about mental illness, printed my short fictional story “Exposure Therapy” in the fall issue. You can find a link to the magazine here: Open Minds Quarterly

Your Turn: Do you enjoy wrapping packages for the holidays or for birthdays? Or, do you try to get someone else to do it for you?

 

Published by ckennedy

Author of the DIY blog: Fixin' Leaks and Leeks. Paper/Rock Writing Consultation, Sole Proprietor.

32 thoughts on “Craft Alert: Lock Up Your Cupcake Liners!”

  4. i use tissue paper to wrap gifts – no bows either. i’m so lazy.

    love your package though – quite pretty. thank you for that geat DIY tip. you’re the best.

    congrats on the stories too.

    blessings.

    Liked by 3 people

    Reply

  9. From My Week 59: Real Christmas Vs. Magazine Christmas: “If you’ve ever gotten a present from me, you might have thought at first that a toddler wrapped it. But the torn paper and scotch tape all over the place just reinforce how much I LOVE you. NOT that I’m super-uncoordinated and have unwieldy manhands.” LOL.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  11. Congrats on having two pieces published!
    I’m all thumbs on wrapping and people sometimes think it’s a prank when they get one of my mummy jobs. And I’ve been told, two rolls of scotch tape for a 5”X7” box is excessive, or obsessive, or something. But no eggnog-plastered Krampus has ever succeeded in breaking into one of my packages.

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  13. I love Christmas, except for the wrapping. I don’t have the patience to do a good job of it, nor do I have the digital dexterity to make it look even passable. And I, of course, don’t want to spend the money to wrap all the gifts I have so carefully chosen for the recipients, so they just have to graciously accept the gift in whatever sorry state they receive it in. Even with the roll of scotch tape I had to use. Bring on the shiny cupcake liners! Isn’t it great to learn something new? Except I think I would probably staple them in place …

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  14. Thanks    for accepting and following my blog.

    I’m available to read your post at my convenient time.

    You have such an interesting topic I will love to read in
    your blog.

    I still remain  the simple blogger…..

    #PATRICKSTORIES
    Peace ✌and Love ❤

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

  15. Congratulations on the publications 🙂
    I save gift bags from the previous year and wrap gifts that way. I like the idea of using cupcake holders to decorate them, might give it a try!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  16. I don’t enjoy wrapping as it takes me FOREVER. I will try to find the perfect scrap of paper to use so I don’t waste the paper and I will try to find the matching label so an non-matching label doesn’t wreck the look of the gift. I don’t like to put EVERYTHING in gift bags. It just takes me FOREVER. My husband will disappear into his office and come out two hours later with 50 gifts wrapped (PERFECTLY, mind you!) and be done. Then he will walk out with all the scraps” of paper he has created because he doesn’t TRY to save paper at all and just cuts away all willy-nilly. ARGH. And here I am spending HOURS trying to us up scraps and not be wasteful.

    Congratulations on the publications. You sure are comical!

    Like

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Change )

Cancel

Connecting to %s