Really Helpful Tips for Wives and Mothers #1: Easy ways to wrap presents without tape!

With the holiday season upon us, more likely then not you have some presents to wrap. And, if you're like me, you can never find the tape when you need some to wrap a present. I used to spend precious minutes looking everywhere for the tape, but not any more! Now, I just use something else, and if you follow these really helpful tips, you too will be able to wrap a present without using any tape at all.

Here are just a few of the ways you can wrap a present without tape:

1. Use a glue stick.  These are usually easy enough to find around your home, and are actually the choice of many pro-wrappers - eliminates those ghastly tape marks that show with regular tape.

2. Use regular glue. This works too, but you need to make sure you don't ruin the present you are trying to wrap.

3. Paint with nail polish. Seriously, polish works as well as glue and looks nice too if you use a glittery shade.

4. Tape with sticky ribbon.  If you have this from other art projects it works great because it is pretty-much just tape with ribbon stuck on top.  An expensive alternative, but again, at least your finished product will be beautiful.

5. Tape with anything that could possibly be considered tape, even if it's not what you think of when you think of present-wrapping-tape. Packing tape. Electrician's tape. My personal favorites: spike tape and duck tape - just present the final project as chic-and-edgy and totally on purpose.  Recently I have gotten so desperate I have even used medical dressing tape - and I'm happy to report it worked just fine.

6.  Apply stickers. I use this option sometimes even when I can find the tape. Looks adorable, uses up some of the 1,893 stickers lying in, on and around every surface of my home, and best of all - if you have kids, they can help wrap the present without driving you completely bonkers.

7. Tie-up with a big piece of ribbon. If you have scissors (again, I usually don't and work with the crease-and-fold cutting system for the wrapping paper) this is even easier because you can cut the ribbon into two, or even several, pieces, and then tie a succession of knotted and bowed strings to keep the wrapper paper in place. This alternative is both easier to do and better looking then it sounds. Trust me.

Do you know other non-tape alternatives that work? Leave a comment below and let us know your favorite way to wrap a gift when there just isn't any tape.

Coming up next in Really Helpful Tips for Wives and Mothers: how to wrap a present beautifully without wrapping paper! Or scissors!