There’s a lot of online articles about cultivating a simple, green, less-commercial season. But who has time to read them? In an effort to truly keep things simple, we’ve gone through a slew of articles and compiled our favorite ideas and tips for the season.
Simple:
This lady has it covered! Michelle at NannyPro has compiled 30 blog posts about scaling down, planning ahead, and managing materialism at the holidays.
Here are a few unique tips from two bloggers that resonated with us:
- Only do traditions that bring your family great joy.
- Say No to the parties.
- Organize your house now to make room for gifts.
- Buy online and ship gifts direct, even to those who live nearby.
Green:
Eartheasy.com offers this startling stat for the Holiday.
“Half of the paper America consumes each year is used to wrap and decorate consumer products. (Source: The Recycler’s Handbook, 1990) In the US, the annual trash from gift wrap and shopping bags totals over 4 million tons.”
No need to be a part of that statistic. Use recycled paper to wrap gifts or buy re-usable cloth gift bags (available at our school store). Here are some other great ideas online for going green:
- Lift the taboo on re-gifting.
- Gift up-cycled items.
- Give the gifts that require no batteries.
- Choose environmentally friendly decorations like LED Lights and Live Potted Trees.
Less Commercial:
We’ve all been urged to buy local and buy less. Here are some ideas for getting buy-in from family. Treehugger.com says:
- Talk to your extended family now about changing gift giving rituals for the long term (you’re not the only one overwhelmed by the stuff).
- Shorten your adult gift list. They’re grown ups. They’ll understand.
- Give those still on the adult list a simple handmade item or small token of gratitude.
- And for the kids, ask your children to create a short gift list and put items in order of importance.
Good luck out there. Enjoy the season!
