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Wrapping paper is boring. Gift bags are boring. Cellophane encrusted baskets are boring. And gift card holders? Sweet merciful Moses they're boring. There are better wrapping materials out there that are so horribly underutilized it depresses the general public. What's happened to resourcefulness and creativity? We spend hours shopping for the perfect gift and minute wrapping them in mass-produced schmaltzing paper. What kind of sense does that make? There has to be a better way, right? Well of course there is, otherwise this whole write-up would be mostly pointless.

The first obvious alternative is newsprint. Wrapping presents in newspaper is a last refuge of the cheap as old as time itself, probably. At least as old as newspapers. And properly done, it can be a boon to your gifting experience. The reactions on your recipients face will be priceless. "Oooh! A Gameboy and last week's comics!" "Oooh! Foreigner's greatest hits and a half-completely Sudoku!" "Oooh! Edible lingerie and a story about the fire downtown that took six lives! Thanks for balancing out my Christmas happiness Uncle Steve!"

The second alternative is the gift box. Now I know the gift box may be an old standard in the ways of gift-clothing, but there are many ways to update this clich canister and make it your own. Try what I call the "nesting approach". Take a small gift, like a ring or a stick of Trident, and place it in a box appropriate for its size. Then place that box in a slightly larger box. Place that box in an even larger box and so on and so on until infinity, or at least until you have a ring nestled deep within the corrugated cardboard bowels of a refrigerator box. Not only is it a great way to waste paper, but it does a fantastic job of getting people's hopes up. The looks on their faces when they open the third or thirtieth box only to find another box is simply priceless.

Your next option is Biaxially-oriented polyethylene terephthalate polyester film, more commonly known as Mylar. For those of you who do not work in the business of the production and distribution of Mylar, it's the material they make those shiny metallic balloons out of. It probably has thousands of other, more practical and interesting uses, but I didn't read that far into the Wikipedia article. For those of you who have ever encountered Mylar, you'll know it's high tensile strength makes it damn near impossible to tear unless you've already cut a little notch to start you off, and then it becomes maddeningly simple.

Try wrapping a child's gift in Mylar and watch with devious delight as they try and fail to rip off the synthetic trappings. Believe you me, it's far more entertaining than any ABC Family made-for-TV romantic comedy about the meaning of Christmas you'll ever see. If that analogy made no sense to you, keep and eye out for "A Biaxially-Oriented Polyethylene Terephthalate Polyester Film Christmas" coming to ABC Family this winter.

Whichever option you chose, know that something as small as locking your son's Wii in a safe can really add new color to your Christmas wrapping experience. Just don't do it with a puppy. Happy wrapping!

Learn more about this author, Andy Paulo.
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