After a holiday immersed in consumerism, I like to take a personal assessment and see how I'm doing toward my goal of greener living. Did I purchase less than last year? Did I avoid gifts that were over-packaged and over-wrapped? As usual, there was progress and room for improvement.
Progress
- More items were purchased locally: I tried to give a "Taste of Iowa" this year to relatives far away. I purchased food items and soaps from local sellers to minimize packaging and support the local economy.
- Less wrapping paper: I used much less wrapping paper this year and so did my kids! Imagine my pride when my grown children arrived with recyclable paper bags and cloth wrapping around their gifts. At the end of the day, we had one small bag of paper that was not recyclable to throw away. A big improvement over the extra-super sized bags of trimmings we used to throw away each Christmas.
Areas to improve
- I purchased more on-line this year than ever before, and so came double wrapping with piles of Amazon boxes. In my defense, I always request that they combine the items into one shipment (doesn't always mean that they do:-(
- I used more paper than I wanted to because I couldn't find paper bags big enough. One commenter on the NYTimes blog had an interesting idea that I think I'll adopt next year.
"Wrapping paper is NOT needed! Several years ago my mother and I bought a bunch of holiday fabric and sewed simple bags out of it in many sizes (cut the tops with pinking shears so you don't have to hem.) We use these bags year after year and they always look great (just tie the top with pretty cloth ribbons that you can re use also.) they are also very easy to store compared to paper. I just fold them up and stick them in a gift bag in my closet. Doesn't matter if they get mashed. This cuts down on our holiday trash considerably." Relizabeth from Norfolk, VA. Green blog NYTimes
How did your left-over packaging stack up to last year?

