We’ve been last-minute wrappers for years. In this case, that meant wrapping Thursday night for me because I had gifts to take to work on Friday, and a family party yesterday. Nevertheless I’m sure some of you still haven’t started, and when you do you lament your wrapping skills.

I was lucky enough to be taught how to wrap gifts by my dad, who’s an awesome gift wrapper. He’s also managed to con my brother and little sister into doing most of his wrapping for him the last few years — which amazes me, since he’s so good at it.

Anyway, here’s a great article on Making Light on how to wrap a package.

Speaking of Dad…

When I was about six, on my way to school around Christmas someone told me that Santa wasn’t real. I’d heard rumors of the same, and I had my doubts because Santa’s handwriting looked a whole lot like Mom’s. I don’t remember whether I said something to my folks about it or not, but I did understand that Santa was magic and not something that you ruined if you didn’t have to.

A few days later Dad and I did our usual shopping for Mom and my brother and Nana. When we got home told me he was going to show me who Santa was. We went into Nana’s bedroom (where all wrapping activities took place) and wrapped all of the gifts. When it came time to write out the tags, we labeled some of them “from Anne” and some of them “from Santa”, because, Dad explained, Santa’s inside all of us. So I couldn’t tell anyone who Santa was, because I’m Santa. So’s Dad, and Mom, and Nana.

I still remember how awesomely special I felt having “the” secret of Christmas — Santa was who you were when you wanted to give something extra special (or extra goofy) and you didn’t feel like you needed to take credit for it.

I had no idea nobody else was using this technique on their kids until I got much older and friends and co-workers were lamenting the “Santa” problem at their own houses, which is why I’m sharing it with you now.

These days, some of the presents under our tree are from Trouble. A few might be from “I’m tired of writing tags already”. (I’m a master of the art of 20 gifts under $20 each, so wrapping takes a looooong time.) JessieDog gives a lot of gifts. A few come from Me, or Us.

The best ones still come from Santa.