No-Waste Holiday Ideas

Here’s some great ideas to help you reduce the amount of waste you generate during the holiday season. By implementing some of these ideas, you can also reduce holiday costs.

Gift wrapping:
Trying to avoid the “gift wrap trap?” Here are some great ideas for gift wrapping alternatives.

• Scarves, handkerchiefs or bandannas.
• Old posters and maps.
• Pages from a child’s coloring book taped together (especially nice for relatives who would enjoy the artwork).
• Old sheet music.
• Newspapers (foreign newspapers are great).
• Last year’s holiday paper (press with warm iron if wrinkled).
• Wallpaper scraps.
• Home-sewn cloth bags.
• Fabric scraps.
• Pictures or advertisements from magazines and catalogs.
• Sunday comic pages.
• A present in a present (for example, a hat in a matching scarf, jewelry in a wooden box, cookies in a reusable tin or cookie jar, barbecue grill utensils or picnic supplies in a tablecloth, kitchen gifts in towels or all-purpose cloths).
• A plain box decorated with leftover glitter, paint, markers, etc.
• A cake pan, basket or a wooden box.
• Reusable decorative bags.
• A “Hollywood box:” individually wrap or decorate the top and bottom of a box with a separate lid. Encourage the recipient to reuse the box.
• Purchase wrapping paper made from recycled paper.

Tree ornaments/decorating:
Here are a few ideas for adding a special touch to holiday decorations.

* Baby’s shoe Memorabilia, such as a child’s first shoe or grandma’s hankie scented with perfume.
* An old full skirt as a tree skirt.
* Old jewelry (restring old necklaces, hang earrings or bracelets).
* Items collected on vacation.
* Small stuffed animals and toys.
* Cookie cutters.
* Miniature toy cars.
* Dressed-up doll as a tree-topper.
* Holiday card ornaments: cut up; glue felt fabric scraps on back; tie with yarn scraps.
* Edible cookie ornaments: use gingerbread or sugar cookie dough; poke a hole at the tip using a drinking straw; decorate and bake; thread a ribbon through hole; tie ribbon in a large loop and hang on bough of tree.
* Small pictures from old magazines or holiday cards: cut out; glue onto old plastic lid; decorate with beads, buttons or jewelry; punch a hole and hang with string or yarn.
* Popcorn and cranberry strings (can be eaten by animals after the holidays). Buttons
* Reusable glass icicles instead of disposable tinsel (keeps tree clean for mulching).
* Buttons knotted on a sturdy length of string.
* Spices from the kitchen instead of commercially prepared and packaged products or aerosols (for example, create pomander balls by placing whole cloves in oranges or lemons to create decorations that look and smell great).
* Gingerbread people and reindeer from leftover brown paper grocery bags (place on windows and walls for decoration.)
* Tin can luminary (punch holes into empty metal can; place candle inside.)

Read our inexpensive Valentine’s ideas!