christmas sacks

For the past few years I have tried to keep Christmas gifts as simple as possible around our house.  The kids draw names among themselves and buy one $20ish gift for whomever they picked and the hubby and I usually buy each other one gift and then I do stocking stuffers... an ornaments, chapstick, mini flashlights, gum, lotion etc.  I also like to throw in a few inexpensive, individualized gifts, maybe a book Micah has wanted or a new Redskins jacket to replace the one that has been worn virtually every day since Max received it last year.  Since these gifts are too big to fit into the stockings, I was looking for an alternative when I came across these bags online.  I loved the idea, and figured it shouldn't be too hard to make my own version of the Christmas sacks.

I just happened to have 4+ yards of white canvas in my fabric cabinet, exactly enough to make 6 large sacks.  (fold the 60"w fabric so that salvage ends meet and cut 24" wide.  Sew sides of bag together and box the corners (I cut 3" squares for my corners) I left the salvage edge exposed and sewed a casing with some red and white fabric about 3.5" down from the top then used ribbon for my tie)

I did a little more research and found these printable iron on decals - exactly what I was looking for!
I love how they turned out and the kids loved them too.  For those of you who don't sew an alternative to making your own bags is to buy white pillow cases to iron the decals on to and just tie the sacks closed with some ribbon.