[caption id="attachment_1187" align="alignleft" width="160" caption="In 5 minutes, my jars of Red Onion Marmalade are festively wrapped and perfect for hostess gifts. "] [/caption] Last weekend I made Red Onion Marmalade, an easy Canadian Living recipe designed to complement savoury meat dishes like turkey, pork, venison, or even chicken. Perfect for sharing over the holidays. This weekend, gift-wrapping expert Corinna vanGerwen, owner of Corinna Wraps, gave a seminar at Papermarché in Toronto, and she's empowered me -- wrap-challenged Colleen -- with simple tricks to make my jars of marmalade pretty. Corinna introduced me to Japanese tissue paper - a sturdier cousin of normal tissue paper that is easy to work with and gives a graphic "pop" to gifts. With the right dimensions of paper (Colleen challenge #1) and a bit of ribbon (Colleen challenge #2), my jars of preserves are now holiday-ready! (Given my challenges, people normally receive a naked jar.) How to wrap 125mL jars of preserves Materials:

• Japanese tissue paper: $2.50/sheet
• Regular tissue paper: $1.00/package
• 0.5 metres ribbon: $0.50 each or less

I'm so wrap-challenged, Alvarez had to supervise. Corinna told me to practice with regular tissue paper so I didn't waste the pretty Japanese paper. After a few tries, Alvarez and I found the perfect dimensions for 125mL jars: 9 inches x 13.5 inches for regular tissue paper 9 inches x 14.5 inches for Japanese tissue paper Wrapping: Corinna showed me how keeping pressure on your paper while wrapping - whether for tissue or regular wrapping paper - makes a big difference. Pull up the short sides first, then draw up the longer sides so your paper forms a "pouffe" on the top of the jar. Work your thumbs into the creases of your wrapped paper for a cleaner, more beautiful finish. Ribbons: Corinna told me not to be afraid of matching off-patterns. The swirly circles in my Japanese paper can be matched with plaid ribbon, when accented with a festive thick red ribbon seen here. Left to right: Brown tissue & green Japanese tissue against plaid-and-red ribbon; red tissue & green Japanese tissue against burgundy ribbon; red tissue & green Japanese tissue against 2 green rattan ribbons. I did it!!!! And if you're as wrap-challenged as me, just contact Corinna. A former decorating editor at our sister publication Style at Home, she's a wealth of knowledge on how to make things beautiful. Are you wrap-challenged? How do you get around it?