Gift bags recycled from store shopping bags

Have you ever gone shopping and come home with your purchases in bags full of the store logo's? Perfect little bags that aren't good for much and seem like a waste to throw out because they are perfectly usable?

Well I was out doing a little Christmas shopping and came home with a few small bags which normally I give to my girls to trapse around the house with them for a week or two. Then when they rip I would just toss them out. Today a light bulb went on (I'm sure some of you have done this before, it can't possibly be original but I don't recall ever stumbling upon this idea before).

To recycle bags like these below

I used some left over wrapping paper on the white one. I glued on a candy cane, filled the bag, added one of the scrabble tile ornaments we made (incase you missed them to see how we made the scrabble tile ornaments and the wrapping paper click HERE).

For the other bag I cut a piece of construction paper slightly smaller then the bag so there was about 1/4inch trim of the bag showing through. We cut paint chips into triangles and glued them on to the red paper to be Christmas trees. Then the girls decorated the trees with sequins and glitter glue. Easy! (FYI I got the paint chip tree idea from HERE)

A wonderful way to reuse and recycle those store shopping bags! Great for birthdays and other gifts too!

See THIS post to see how I recycled manadarin boxes last year

We've got a nice litte collection of these again this year :)