The holidays are here and everyone is celebrating! We all have our traditions for the holidays. Making grandma's famous cookie recipe for the cookie exchange. Shopping for all the best gifts to give family and friends and of course picking out the best Christmas tree you can find.
We are sharing some of our favorite holiday traditions with a sustainable twist.
Here are a few tips we came up with this year to spread sustainable Christmas cheer!
Buy a live potted tree to decorate. Instead of cutting down a tree to bring home and decorate this year, our family decided to buy a live tree that we can plant after the holiday is over. Sure it's not the biggest tree in the window on our block but we still had fun decorating it together.
Reuse brown paper bags and newspaper for gift wrapping. Turn your grocery bags inside out and wrap presents with them. You can paint or stamp holiday decor like trees, snowflakes or stars to make the paper more festive. Use ribbons or strings you save from other purchases or gifts that were given to you for other occasions to spruce them up.
Make gifts to give out this year. Everyone loves a delicious hot chocolate or cookie recipe. Make your friends your favorite Christmas cookies and include the recipe for them to use with those mouth watering treats. If you are more of a crafter than a baker you can make a tree ornament that they can keep forever and think of you every time they decorate their live tree.
Give your time. Quality time is priceless. Make it a point to spend time together with those you cherish the most. Bake cookies together. Give a helping hand to the parents that need to go Christmas shopping for the kids by babysitting for free one afternoon. Or you can volunteer for the many charities that take place during the holidays that help those who are less fortunate to have a more love filled holiday.
Shop Local. Shop small. It's so easy to log onto that Amazon account and check off your shopping list but where's the personal touch in doing it that way? Be different. Buy from a small business you follow online. Take a day or a weekend to visit the local shops in your community. Not only are you supporting small businesses and local shops but you will find more unique and thoughtful gifts for your loved ones adding more meaning to that gift you'll be giving mom this year.
These are just a few of our favorite things to share with you. We'd love to hear what you could add to this sustainable list of Christmas Cheer. Feel free to comment or send us your ideas. We'd love to hear from you.
Happy Holidays!
