Saturday, December 4, 2010

It's Holiday Time Again!



I love the Holiday Season. And I love decorations and wrapping presents and making everything look beautiful, and... and... and... I hate all the waste!!!

Since I haven't written since last December, it's obvious that the huge excess of the season inspires me to be a little greener. To accomplish a more planet-friendly version of Christmas this year that still fits within my ideals of decorating, I've been setting things aside all year to use in December. I put a basket in my craft closet, and I've been adding to it whenever something strikes me as beautiful, even in an unconventional way.


The first round of wrapping is complete! This collection of gifts will be going to our nieces and nephew in Tennessee. The paper is recycled brown paper. The ribbons are either scraps, or from my stash (that I am no longer adding to). And the decorations are all onion and potato bags. The tags are scraps that I've been saving from my scrapbooking projects.

At the beginning of the year, I was worried that I would start to feel like a trash packrat. But it really didn't add up to much, and it only grew out of the basket when I started saving a few containers, like the tins that hold steel cut oats. I cut back on buying bagged onions and potatoes, and now only buy those when it's the only option, or when the loose ones don't look good. I'm also not scrapbooking as much, because it's so time consuming and costly. So for the whole year, the pile didn't get out of control, not even close. And of the parts of the family I send gifts to, one whole family's gifts were easily covered with these scraps.

Best of all, except for running out of tape, I didn't have to spend a dime on wrapping these presents. I had the paper leftover from a previous project, one spool of ribbon came from my stash, and everything else was scraps.

I already sent off one box - and I didn't wrap those gifts at all. I used a basket that was a gift to hold the rest of the gifts, no wrapping needed. This completes box number two. That leaves one more group of gifts to wrap and send, and then the gifts we exchange here at home. I'm hoping they all end up as green as these!

7 comments:

Guam Homshers said...

Visiting via Money Saving Mom.... I had thought of reusing our grocery paper bags, and this post gave me the "push" I needed to carry that through to action! Very creative ideas - thanks for sharing!
~Melody

Johnlyn said...

I LOVE the idea of the onion bag. Good idea not to buy them in the first place, but I have found them to be so much cheaper.

Thanks for sharing at Money Saving Mom.

Anonymous said...

Bless you and your military family

Sarah said...

What a great idea! My hubby looked at me sideways a couple of times as I stuffed an onion bag into my onion-bag-jar (his mom has definite pack rat tendencies). I wasn't sure what I was going to use them for, but thought they were neat and I was determined to find a use. Now I know! Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Visiting via Money Saving Mom also. I use the funnies from the sunday paper for wrapping paper. The kids love reading the funnies and they turn out quite nice.

Love the onion bag idea.
Carlene

Amy S said...

Goodness! I think this is terrific! I've always wondered what I could do with all of those bags that I get, because we use a ton of both veggies! Thanks for sharing your creative idea!

Anonymous said...

These gifts look great, my dad reuses the onion bags for suet for the birds in his yard, but maybe I will have to save a few for this.