One More Holiday Hack: DIY Gift Baskets

Around Thanksgiving when all the Christmas stuff started showing up, I was perusing a display of fancy gift baskets at our local market. As everyone probably already knows, the baskets themselves tend to be pretty flimsy, and the total worth of the things in the basket is always far less than the whole cellophane-wrapped affair costs. The ones I was seeing were wooden crates with chocolates, wine, and/ or other edible goodies for thirty, forty, fifty dollars.

Hmmmm. I wasn’t sure where to get crates like those, but I was sure I could make my own. So I put that thought aside and completed my shopping. Which included clementines. In a wooden crate.

Aha! I told Hubby my plan, and he chuckled: And you’ll have time when?

Well, I saved a months’ worth of clementine crates (we eat a lot of clementines), and one afternoon last week, I lugged the three-quarters of a can of Benjamin Moore ‘Cranberry’ red wall paint left over from our dining room makeover, threw down a drop cloth, and painted. Took me less than thirty minutes:

I ordered a long roll of cellophane, basic festive ribbon, and wholesale-priced dark chocolates from Amazon. Hubby got a case of wine at discount. Then in bits of spare time this past week, I made batches of chocolate bark. Early this morning, I baked cookies.

Then, I assembled a bunch of gift baskets (or gift crates, if you will):

At least one person assumed I’d bought theirs at the same local market that had given me the idea, and everyone remarked how pretty they were. Win!

Recycled packaging, repurposed wall paint, inexpensive cellophane and ribbon, plus a mishmash of baked goods, chocolate, and wine equals impressive gift baskets.

And, it was a fun project! Especially proving to Hubby it could be done.

Merry Christmas!