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Loriee
D. Evans, Conscious
Choice (www.consciouschoice.com)
Reprinted from AlterNet.org
Weeks of shopping, days of wrapping, hours of decorating
and carefully arranging gifts underneath the tree -- and it's
all over in a few minutes. While the kids chortle over new
toys, you contend with a mountain of shredded paper, ribbon,
and bows. It leaves you wishing you'd asked for a bulldozer.
Now multiply your small mountain of holiday rubble by millions
of families nationwide. That's a lot of trash. Americans throw
away 25 percent more garbage between Thanksgiving and New
Year's, or an extra one million tons each week of gift-wrap,
bows, fruitcake, turkey leftovers, and other festivity-induced
offerings that don't make it to the New Year.
According to the Use Less Stuff
Report (ULS), a bi-monthly newsletter on waste
reduction, if every household would reuse just two feet of
ribbon each year, the resulting 38,000 miles of ribbon could
tie a bow around the earth.
But a gift outlasts its presentation, and if chosen well,
is meaningful with or without fancy entrapments. "Little
kids just want to get to what's inside the paper," says
Bob Lilienfeld, editor of the ULS Report. "They don't
sit and look at bows or count the sheets of wrapping paper
you used. You have a real opportunity to use less paper, because
they really just want to get to the present."
Kids of all ages and cultures express kinship and friendship
through gift-giving, so whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah,
or Kwanzaa, you're bound to face the pressure to wrap a trinket
or two. The trick is to avoid adding to that five million
tons of holiday garbage. Instead of relying on rolls of gift-wrap,
try shrouding your offerings in creativity. Our gift for the
holidays is a list of practical and fun ways you can reduce
your impact on the planet this season by wrapping gifts in
"green."
Alternative Kinds of Paper Wrap
Festive paper wrappings don't just come in shiny red rolls.
For example, do you buy fresh flowers for your house when
family comes? What do you do with the floral-motifed paper
or brightly-colored tissue protecting the blooms? Don't toss
it, because that paper has another job to do: wrap up holiday
gifts.
On that colorful theme, dig through your travel materials
and pull out old maps you don't plan to use again. These large
sheets are just the right size for books, small shirt boxes,
ties, and other medium-sized gifts. And speaking of shirt
boxes, simply stuff clothing into a shopping bag and wrap
it up. You save on the freshly-minted paperboard -- which,
of course, is both reusable and recyclable if you receive
a few new outfits in those department store boxes yourself.
For more options, head for the refrigerator.
Is it plastered with works of youthful art that only a grandparent
truly appreciates? Then have the kids wrap their gifts to
grandma and grandpa with their own artwork.
If you're not willing to part with the art, wrap gifts in
paper grocery sacks, and set the kids to work creating holiday
originals with markers and crayons. Just don't be surprised
when the folks ooh and aah over the wrapping more than the
gift. But even if they're not enraptured by the artistry,
they can simply recycle the packaging after you and the kids
have gone.
Now that it's November, the 2000 calendars have nearly finished
their tour of duty. So rip the first ten months off the wall,
and use the eye-catching photos to wrap small gifts like jewelry
boxes. For more photos, try old magazines -- which are recyclable,
unlike most gift-wrap paper. You can match photos to a recipient's
interests, like shots of anglers from an outdoor magazine
for an avid fisherman or pictures of baked goods for a cook.
The searching and pasting takes a little effort, but in the
spirit of the holiday season, you show that you care.
Bags and Boxes
Now let's say you have an odd-shaped gift you're not sure
how to package, or maybe you'd like to set an example by giving
reusable packaging. Those popular gift sacks make great gift-wraps,
but why buy them new when you can make your own? Simply save
those little structured shopping sacks with handles that finer
stores use to bag purchases.
Sit down with your sack collection at a spacious work area
with several tools: scissors, tape or glue, and scraps of
holiday wrapping paper, ribbon, and/or a holiday themed magazine.
Cut out holiday photos from the magazine or season's greetings
from the gift wrap scraps, paste them over each bag's store
logo, and presto! Holiday gift bags. Once you've placed the
gift in the bottom of the bag, filch through old shoeboxes
in the closet for tissue to stuff into the bags. You can use
markers to color a holiday theme on the tissue.
After you run out of bags, use the same creativity on the
shoeboxes. After you cover up the tennis shoe logos with festive
magazine photos, spruce up the top of the box with old, sparkly
costume jewelry. Or collect holly branches, red berries, pinecones,
cedar sprigs, and other natural decorations from outside.
A glue gun works wonders for adhering twigs to a box top,
but good old Elmer's suffices in a pinch.
If you have a large sturdy box, try starting a new family
tradition. Choose an unusual or holiday family photo, protect
it with clear contact paper or lamination, and then glue it
to the box. Using a permanent marker, write a funny story
about the photo underneath it. Then pass the box along --
with a gift inside -- to the grandparents, aunts, or uncles,
with the stipulation that the next time they give someone
in your family a gift, they must add their own photo and story.
In a few years, the photogenic box could become a centerpiece
for the holiday dinner.
Simple cloth bags also make handy reusable holiday packaging.
Here's a quick primer on making them. Fold some festive fabric
in half with good sides in and cut a rectangle of the desired
size, but do not cut the folded edge (this will be the bottom
of the bag). You now have a long rectangle when unfolded.
At each end of the rectangle, fold the rough edge in toward
the inside of the fabric and sew down with a sixteenth-inch
seam, then fold it over once again (same direction) about
a half-inch and sew it down, leaving a tunnel for a ribbon
or cord drawstring. Then, starting at the bottom of the bag,
sew the edges on each side. Turn it inside out, thread ribbon
through the tunnel, insert gift, and give with a clean conscience.
Around the House
Now it's time to donate stuff you never use to the green
holiday cause. Do you have a collection of old woven baskets
hiding out on a closet shelf? The baskets make a quaint presentation,
and you can simply crinkle a little tissue paper on top of
the gift and tie a bit of ribbon on the handle.
For small gifts, how about using the same technique on those
chipped holiday mugs in the kitchen? For larger gifts, turn
to reusable tote bags, like those used for grocery shopping,
which can pack away new jeans, books, even computer accessories.
Then the recipients will think of you every time they carry
their groceries out of the supermarket.
For big gifts, like bicycles or CD racks, draft seasonal
tablecloths or sheets into double duty. Simply drape the cloth
over the present, and stick a bow on it. Or, if you don't
have any colorful cloth handy, consider simply applying the
bow to more unwieldy presents.
If your kids savor their rewards following a little effort,
take some pointers from the annual Easter egg hunt. The whole
family can get into the fun of a treasure hunt. Place the
first clue under the breakfast cereal bowl, and hide successive
clues throughout the house, each clue leading to the next
and then finally to the "treasure." The family involvement
is definitely in the spirit of the season.
Say It with a Gift
You can also minimize gift-wrap by minimizing the size of
your gift. Gift certificates are a traditional standby for
that hard-to-get relative, while savings bonds are still good
choices for youth. If you want to give something more personal,
pick up concert tickets for the teenybopper or game tickets
for the sports fanatic.
Children, parents, and grandparents also find meaning in
a gift of time. "My favorite gift was when I was twelve,"
says Lilienfeld. "We lived in New York, and my father
took me and two friends to a Yankees game. Some of the gifts
you remember the most are emotional things, the good times
we spend with other people rather than inanimate objects.
Memory is part of the gift."
How about a certificate good for a winter season's worth
of snow shoveling? Or ten "chaffeur"-driven errands?
Or three home-cooked dinners? If your folks live out-of-state,
offer a weekend vacation with the family. Mom and dad might
appreciate a few certificates good for baby-sitting sessions
from the grandparents. These gifts save on paper, goods, and
materials, and they make the most out of family relationships.
One of the best wrappings, though, is a gift itself. Hide
a trowel and seed packets in a plant potter for the family
gardener, place new earrings in a jewelry box for the ladies,
or stuff new gloves and scarf into a warm hat for just about
anybody.
A Green Holiday Season
Now that you have a few green wrapping ideas, you may need
some extra supplies. Keep the cycle going by shopping antique
stores, flea markets, and estate sells. Tablecloths and blankets
are always big items, though you might have to search for
holiday-themed material, ornamental boxes and bags can be
had for a song, and old costume jewelry and other knick-knacks
are available for decorating. You're reusing and reducing
at the same time.
Of course, there's another way to go green. "The easiest
technique for reducing gift wrap," says Lilienfeld, "is
to reduce the number of gifts. There are diminishing returns
with more gifts, and it becomes 'oh, another one.'" So
when seasonal consumerism swirls madly around you at the shopping
mall, pause to take a deep breath and think about the meaning
of Christmas, the spirit of Kwanzaa, the history of Hanukkah.
Then think about the unique personalities of those near and
dear, and choose one or two gifts with special meaning, something
they'll treasure long after the gift-wrap's turned to dust.
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