Tips for an Eco-Friendly Holiday Season!

Who loves this time of year?

Twinkly lights, extra sweets, and Christmas music. Fun decorations everywhere, jolly music, and seeing the joy of giving everywhere you look.

With my family, Christmas is our big holiday. We don’t do birthdays or Thanksgiving or Easter. But Christmas is OUR TIME. We love decorating the whole house, inside and outside. We always have a tree with tons of ornaments we’ve gotten over the years. And it seems no matter how hard we’ve been on money growing up, my parents always make sure we had some presents under the tree.

Over the last couple of years I’ve been putting a lot of time and energy into trying to decrease my carbon footprint as much as possible. I’ve been trying to learn as much as I can about ways to help protect and restore the environment, and how to help minimize the damage being done.

Now if you are like me and ‘going green’ is important to you… what do you think about all of the Christmas chaos? As you are putting out plastic decorations and using an unnecessary amount of shiny, manufactured wrapping paper… does it make you cringe?

I know, for me, I can’t stand all of the unnecessary waste the holiday season creates. However, that doesn’t mean I’m necessarily willing to give up most of my traditions! I love these traditions with my family and they are incredibly important to us!

So I spent some time reading and listening to a few podcasts about how to have the most eco friendly holiday we can! I’d love to share tips, tricks, and just interesting things I learned!

BUY SECOND HAND.

Lights, decorations, ornaments, and faux Christmas trees can all be bought used. Thrift stores, Craigslist, and Facebook marketplace are all great for this! I’ve even seen some decorations and trees listed for free!

HOLIDAY LIGHTS.

•Reuse lights. This should be a no brainer, but you’d be surprised. I’ve actually met people who buy new lights EVER SINGLE YEAR. (Yikes! Lots of wasted materials and money)

•Use LED lights. They are 80% more efficient than incandescent lights. They generate less heat and save you money! LED lights also last 25x times longer than other ones!

•Put your lights on a timer! They don’t need to be going all day and night. Have them turn on when it’s starting to get dark, and turn off when you go to bed.

ORNAMENTS.

Ornaments are another big tradition that cause a lot of waste, but a tradition many people aren’t willing to give up. My family gets each kid one every every year, a special one that is representative of what’s going on in our life at that time. These are the only ones we buy and put up, but they’re super fun and special! We can see over the years the different sports we were into, the hobbies we had, and the things we experienced!

Now if you don’t have any sentimental ornaments, and you don’t want to just buy a bunch of plain, boring ones… don’t! One alternative is to make them on your own!

Check out this article that has tons of cute ideas: 10 Easy Eco-friendly Christmas Decorations That Look Awesome

OTHER DECORATIONS.

Get creative here! Instead of garland, string up popcorn or cranberries! Instead of plastic snowmen, use marshmallows and sticks from outside. Decorate pine cones and tree branches. Make snowflakes out of junk mail. There’s so many cute and easy ideas for this, you just have to get creative!

WRAPPING PRESENTS.

Fun (**disturbing?) fact I heard on the ‘good together’ podcast: If every US family wrapped just 3 gifts in reusable paper, it would save enough paper to cover 45,000 football fields…

There are so many better alternatives to commercial wrapping paper.

•Clothes or other pieces of fabric that you were going to throw away or donate are a great option!

•If you are like the average American that has a mailbox, I’m sure you receive tons of unwanted catalogs, magazines, newspapers, and other paper products. I’m sure a lot of these end up in the garbage or recycling. USE THESE! There’s nothing wrong with wrapping up a nice gift in a grocery store coupon packet!

•You can always wrap a gift in something you could also give as an additional gift! Scarves, towels, shirts, blankets… all wonderful options!

•When you get boxes from different things, save them! Boxes are perfect to put presents in. And if you want to spruce them up a little bit… take some time to paint or color them. This adds some fun and some extra love to the gift!

•Put the gifts in reusable items. This can include mason jars, tins, baskets, or nicer boxes or chests.

TIPS FOR GIFTS.

Cards– I, personally, love cute cards. I’m one of those people that has saved every card I’ve gotten since I was a kid.

I’m not going to say people shouldn’t buy cards, but we can be more conscious of them when we do. Cards with glitters, sparkles, extra items, and plastics are NOT recyclable.

The other thing with cards, if you have the time, make your own! I LOVE getting handmade cards more than store bought ones. They’re so much more meaningful!

The next part of this is just cutting down on wasteful gifts in general. Some retail industry analysts estimate that 90 bullion dollars worth of gifts are returned each season.

The most returned gifts:

1. Clothing & shoes

2. Kitchen stuff & other glassware

3. Sweets

Some tips for cutting down on gift waste:

•Use a wish list! We use wish lists for baby showers, bridal showers, weddings… why not use it for the holidays? When people ask what you want, give them a list!

I’ve had people tell me this is rude, but it’s not?! If you’re going to buy me a present anyways… wouldn’t you want to buy me something I want or need? Instead of something random, just to get it?

•Buy quality gifts! This is pretty self explanatory, but it’s a huge one. Buy quality, long lasting gifts for people. Gifts that will not only last a long time, but that they will use for a long time.

•Food gifts! This is an excellent idea for people who love to cook and people who don’t… everyone eats 😉 You can get creative with different spices, rubs, cooking oils, and sauces! My mom gets me a hot sauce sampler pack every year and it’s one of my favorite gifts. If it’s something that can be eaten, cooked with, or put on food, it’s a fantastic present idea!

If you are buying for someone who drinks, alcohol is another great gift idea. Get them a nice bottle of liquor or wine, or a case of beer! You can’t go wrong with alcohol for anybody that enjoys drinking… definitely a present that will get used!

•Gift experiences! This one is a little harder this year with COVID, but there are still some options. Usually I would recommend movie tickets, dinner party tickets, comedy shows, concerts, ball games, escape rooms, fishing charters.. there are so many options! Unfortunately, a lot fewer events are going on this year, but there’s still some experiences open that you can give to people.

•Money! Gift cards to places you shop at are an awesome gift. I also believe we should normalize giving people money as a present! If you genuinely don’t know what someone would want or need, but you want to get them something, give them a card with some cash in it. (You could even avoid the card and use a form of electronic payment) Everyone uses money, everyone likes having money, so there should be nothing frowned upon about giving money as a gift!

Some other helpful tips for this holiday season:

•Shop early! Shopping delays are going to be way worse than other years.

•Shop locally!! This not only supports local businesses, but it saves on shipping costs. Also avoiding the shipping and packaging cuts down significantly on carbon emissions and packaging materials.

Don’t forget to enjoy this time of year. Take some time to decompress and slow down. Enjoy the time with your family and loved ones, if you are able to be with them. And if you’re not, enjoy the solitude. 2020 was a crazy year for everyone. Let’s go into 2021 with a clear mind, a full heart, and a hunger for your dream life.