WRAP IT UP!
Most of you have done your Christmas shopping - I hope! If you're like me, your toddler probably felt the need to help you. Toddlers don't fully understand the whole "giving presents" idea of Christmas, but you can help facilitate this and pretend you are giving in to their desires by letting them help you wrap the presents. Don't worry - it's not as daunting as it sounds, and this is not a contest for "America's Funniest Home Video."

Presentation is the key to a great present. A simple homemade sand candle or a paperweight that began as a favorite rock from Nantucket can both become the prized gift under the tree with the right wrapping. If you and your toddler have made homemade gifts to give away, making homemade wrapping paper is another way to say Happy Holidays to the recipients of your gifts as well as the world as a whole.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reports that the volume of household garbage increases by about 25 percent between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day - from 4 million to 5 million tons. Much of that waste is wrapping paper and cards. If you want to purchase wrapping paper, or just don't have time to create a homemade replica, make sure you select wrapping paper made from recycled paper. Foil paper is not recyclable, as well as those beautiful bows. This is the time to follow those first two parts of the three "R"s - reduce and reuse.

Gift tags can be made from old Christmas cards. Simply cut the front portion of the card off and use the entire front or a particular image from the front. Once you have the tag cut out, use a hole punch to create a hole where you can thread in ribbon or yarn to tie it to the present.

Simple homemade wrapping paper can be made from rolled craft paper. If you don't have time to get to the store for craft paper, or if you want this to be a recycling project, use those grocery bags that have piled up in your recycling bin. Cut the bag from top to bottom on both sides to create a flat piece of paper. The inside is perfect for this project, and you will be getting rid of your recycling without having to go to the dump!

You can use finger paint to decorate the paper with your toddler's footprints and handprints. If you're feeling courageous, use your old copies of The Nantucket Independent to create a workspace on the floor. Roll out the craft paper or lay the flattened grocery bags on top of the

newspapers. Pour the finger paint onto paper plates. Let your toddler step in the paint and walk around on the craft paper. Have an aluminum pan of warm water ready to let your child step in when the time comes in order to wash the paint off their feet, and hands, and anywhere else it has gravitated.

If you're too frazzled from holiday shopping and can't even begin to imagine setting your toddler loose with paints, there are other options. Purchase brown paper sandwich bags from the grocery store. Let your toddler decorate the bags with markers, crayons and stickers. For a sparkling bag, apply glue in various shapes on the bag and let your toddler sprinkle glitter to make beautiful snowflakes and snowmen. Make sure you have them apply the glitter over a paper plate or a newspapered work surface or you will end up with a glitter wonderland of your own. Of course, if you're running late on decorating the house, this project could cut your "to do" list by two items instead of one. Punch two holes at the top of the bag and insert a piece of yarn or ribbon to tie a bow and close the bag.

If your children are too old to find fingerpaints and glitter delightful, you can enlist them in recycling interesting paper to wrap gifts. Old or outdated maps from family trips make interesting wrapping paper. It also allows you to reuse that old map before it ends up in the recycling bin.

Have relatives that live far away and are always asking about Nantucket? Wrap up their presents in pages from The Nantucket Independent. I know this is a shameless plug, but - think about also giving them a subscription to The Independent so they can keep up with your world, and even use those pages to wrap your gifts next year.

No matter what you and your family decide to use to wrap those precious gifts, remind your children that the holiday season is about the gift of giving. Doing something for someone else, be it little or big, is the reason for the season, and that's a lesson our children are never too young to learn. And a lesson

we are never too old to remember. I