It's Easy Being Green

With just a few days left before Christmas, many people are probably busy switching gears into wrapping mode.  All of my wrapping is done but I know many last minute procrastinators who don’t wrap until the 11pm witching hour on Christmas Eve.  There are many ways you can make the wrapping process a little greener this year.

First, consider alternative ways to wrap your presents instead of using the traditional roll of paper purchased from the store.  You can use just about anything.  One of my personal favorites is using the “funnies” from the newspaper.  It’s colorful and fun!  You can also old posters, maps, sheet music and any other piece of recycled paper you can think of.  People have also suggested wallpaper scraps, scarves, pillowcases and fabric remnants.

If you’re more into bags, a lot of the shopping bags you get while doing the holiday shopping could double as gift bags once you get to wrapping.  You can just use some ribbon and tissue paper to dress it up a notch.  Clothing can be rolled up tightly and tied with a piece of ribbon before sticking in a stocking or placing it under the tree.  Large items in a box can be hidden with a blanket or by tieing a scarf around it.  Small items like jewlry or cell phones can be hidden inside the tree.  I’ve done this a couple of times and have gotten a lot of enjoyment watching my recipient trying to find their hidden gift and then see their surprise when they finally pull it out of the branches.

It’s also good to think about how you can recycle all that wrapping paper.  A lot of municipal recycling programs can’t recycle the glossy, printed wrapping paper.  If that’s the case you might want to consider going for the old fashioned look by using plain craft paper.  You can use rubber stamps to dress up the wrapping paper and decorate it yourself.  Than you can rest a little easier knowing that mountain of paper won’t be headed toward the landfill.

Do you have any suggestions on how to reduce, reuse or recycle your gift wrapping?  Please share them if you do!

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Here in Evansville, Indiana, recycling seems to be somewhat antiquated.  Compared to the system we had in Flagstaff, Arizona, there are even fewer things the recycling program here will accept.  To make matters worse, they only provide you with one small bin to put all your stuff into.  I quickly made friends with the man who runs our curbside pickup (which by the way, only happens every two weeks and is a huge drawback for big time recyclers like us) because I watched him have to sort out every category of item and place them in specific bins at the curb.  I thought that just seemed a terrible waste of time for him and decided we would sort our own items into separate containers.  Using old plastic storage bins, we now have four containers we place curbside.

My Crude Recycling Setup

Yesterday, I completed a week’s worth of sorting duties on the back porch and was amazed at how much we actually recycle.  Each week, we generally only produce one or two bags of garbage thanks to composting the organics and sorting out the recyclables.  My  neighbors aren’t so diligent though and that’s when I ran across something they should watch.

A Canadian filmmaker has released a new project that is all about our waste: the trash you put in that container to be picked up and hauled away.  Andrew Nisker shot his documentary using the McDonald family.  The family of five were asked to collect every piece of trash they generated over three months and keep it in their garage.  What was generated three months later is said to be an eye-opener.

Garbage: The Revolution Starts at Home runs 76 minutes and explores the waste generated by the family as well as where the materials came from to generate the waste and where they will go in the end.  The film shows how we act with our garbage has a profound impact on our surrounding environment.  To learn more about the film or to order a copy, head over to their website by clicking the link above.  I think it’s worth a look-see and can’t wait to watch the film.

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