Christmas 2019 is going to be a Christmas of doing things differently in our household! Every year I am saddened by the excessive consumption of everything during the Festive Season. Excessive food, excessive packaging, excessive drinking, excessive rushing around, excessive shopping, excessive everything! Yes - Christmas is a time for celebration and fun, but surely we can celebrate and have fun without damaging our health and destroying the planet while we’re at it? This year we are doing things differently in our household ...
My husband and I put our heads together and created our “maximum fun, minimum (environmental) impact” Christmas plan! We are hosting Christmas lunch at our house this year, so we sent messages to all our guests who are coming on Christmas day requesting that they get their green thumbs on for Christmas this year - every dish that is contributed for the Christmas lunch feast needs to feature a home grown ingredient (at least one!). Our Secret Santa gifts this year are going to be sustainable - each person is to bring a unisex gift with a maximum value of $20 that has to be purchased from a charity shop. All gifts are to be wrapped in recycled newspaper or reused gift wrapping ... we weren’t sure how this was going to go down with our guests! Fortunately we were pleasantly surprised to get a very enthusiastic response from our guests - excellent! Our “Sustainable Christmas” plan was coming together!
Our children had been so excited to decorate our Christmas tree and said that ALL of their friend’s had already put their Christmas trees up! So on Wednesday afternoon the kids came home from school and decided that no matter what, the Christmas tree was going up that day! And then began the drama ... My husband and I had envisaged investing in a live tree in a lovely pot (maybe an olive tree or an Aussie native) that we could decorate and have on display in the lounge for Christmas and then carry out into the garden where it could live happily during the year. The next Christmas we would carry it back inside, decorate it and repeat year after year - “Sustainable Christmas Tree” tick. But our daughter was not AT ALL on board with this idea! The more we tried to convince her that a living tree was the best, most environmentally-friendly kind of Christmas tree, the more upset she got - tears, screaming ... a complete meltdown! None like we had seen through her ”terrible two’s” or at any other time for that matter. When she could eventually calm herself down enough to explain why she was so upset, she said “But Mom, that won’t feel like Christmas to me. Every Christmas I have been alive for, we have built our fake tree and decorated it with the same decorations. If we already have a Christmas tree why do we have to go and buy a new one?”. And just like that ... the words of my 6 year old stopped me in my tracks! How could I possibly argue with that very sound and sustainable logic?
And so, after that profound input from our daughter, our approach to a “Sustainable Christmas Tree” was tweaked. We conducted a bit more research into the environmental impacts of different kinds of Christmas trees and we came across an analysis claiming that a plastic Christmas tree needed to be used at least 20 times before it’s environmental impact equalled that of a live cut tree. So after all that, the most sustainable option for us is in fact to stick with our plastic tree for 8 more years before we invest in our potted live tree (or any other tree for that matter)! So we decided to embrace our good old faithful plastic tree and the kids handmade decorations from their Christmas arts and crafts over the years ... and there is indeed something very comforting about the familiarity of all the old decorations coming out year after year and reminiscing about where they all come from.
Our “Sustainable Christmas” plan is now very much focussed on being resourceful with that which we already have and keeping the focus on what Christmas is all about ...
- We’re going to be reusing our dear little reindeer serviette holders that we made 4 years ago with the kids tiny handprints stamped onto toilet rolls.
- We’re going to be using any little glass jars that we have in the house and filling them with foliage and flowers from the garden to decorate the tables rather than buying cut flowers.
- We are going to reduce the amount of meat and increase the amount of fresh produce on the menu and support only local breweries and organic wineries for our Christmas Day celebrations.
- We are going to do less rushing around and having fun with our loved ones.
- We are going to do less screen time and more being present.
- We are going to give more and gather less.
How do you intend to have a “Maximum fun, minimum impact” festive season?
