Facts:

I personally was raised with Christmas – trees, cookies, gifts, the whole darn deal. I liked it and as a kid thought it was mostly fun, but I never loved how hectic it was, and by the time I was in my early 20s I was sick of the whole planning perfect gifts mess.

By the time my son Cedar was born, his dad and I wanted to do something for the winter holiday season, but we couldn’t quite place what that was.

Since Cedar was born we’ve had years with Christmas trees and years without and even years with living trees. Years with big stressful get-togethers and years where we’d just chill with friends. We’ve had MANY years of trying to balance gift giving because we like the less is more idea, but just try getting people on board – it sucks. You say, please do not get me anything, and people just won’t listen.

What’s hard is finding a balance. You could be green by avoiding the winter holiday season altogether but that’s extreme and doesn’t really build any sort of tradition for kids. You could say screw green and have a big ol’ celebration with lots of bling – the other extreme. OR you can find balance. It’s finding a balance that everyone will agree with that’s hard because it’s not just your little household; it’s extended family, friends, co-workers, and more.

This year, I seriously want to make a change. I’ve managed to green up many areas of my life, but finding the perfect (or a good) green Christmas is one area where I could use some help. In a perfect world… we’d find some traditions to keep like organic cookie making day or giving gifts that are all green and homemade and personalized, and ditch the holiday traditions that aren’t working so well – i.e. extended family not listening when we say JUST ONE GIFT! Or maybe deciding to skip the Christmas tree forever.

In order to sort out my own family’s idea of the perfect holiday and to help readers along, I thought we’d get started early this year. It can take some time to plan a fun, meaningful, and still green winter holiday season. To get you (and me) going, following are some useful resources that can help anyone start planning a greener, more meaningful holiday season.

Two useful sites:

• Buy Nothing Christmas – an excellent kick off point. If you want to start practicing early you can ditch Black Friday and join up with Buy Nothing Day.
• The Simple Living Network

Two cool books:

• Green Christmas
• Celebrate Green

I’ve got some more resources coming up as well as some tips for a green and meaningful holiday season. For now you tell me – what are your plans this year for a greener holiday season?

[image via stock.xchng]

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What’s this contest about?:

ChicoBags, maker of yes, all things reusable bags, and Green Halloween, a non-profit, grassroots movement that was created by Celebrate Green author Corey Colwell-Lipson, in order to promote sustainable Halloween traditions teamed up to bring this contest to kids.

Children ages 1-13 are encouraged to enter the contest by submitting an original drawing best depicting the spirit of a Green Halloween. Artistic talent is not the focus of the contest, but the design that best captures the “spirit” of a Green Halloween is. The hope is that children participating will be inspired to make greener choices for Halloween and other celebrations throughout the year.

Images are due by October 24, 2009 – 5:00 PM Pacific Time. (Winner will be notified no later than 11/5/09.)

PRIZES!

If your child wins, her design will be printed on ChicoBags sold through retailers nation-wide and a portion of the proceeds will be donated to Treeswing, a nonprofit organization that promotes healthy eating and lifestyle habits for children. (Last year’s bag was even featured on The Bonnie Hunt Show!). First and second place winners, as well as a runner up, will receive a variety of fantastic prizes including some of the most popular eco-friendly goodies and some shriek-worthy monetary awards to be announced in the coming weeks.

Learn more about the 2nd Annual Trick-Or-Treat Bag Design Contest.

Learn more about Green Halloween & ChicoBags:

• Green Halloween
• ChicoBags, a Fun Solution
• Have You Tried a ChicoBag?

Let me know if your kids enter and good luck!

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Saint Patrick’s Day is quickly coming up – March 17th, so if you haven’t made plans there’s still time to green up your activities…

For some easy general ideas read:

• Green Your St. Patrick’s Day Party
• St. Patrick’s Day Blog Carnival
• Learn how to turn your organic brew green (yes the color green). Oooo festive.
• If you’re really advantageous, you can always recycle your beer cans into butterflies

If you’re specifically looking for information on greener brew to drink on the big day you can do one of the following:

Check your local yellow pages (or online) for a green pub near you. You’d be surprised how many organic and natural breweries are popping up. Three places I’ve lived have had one or two green pubs.

Look at the market for local organic beer. Even if your town is sans a totally organic brew pub, there’s a good chance that one or two local breweries still make and sell organic beer and wine.

There are some national brands as well. Some ideas…

• Green Beer for St. Patrick’s Day – ideas from the Sierra Club.
• All sorts of green alcohol companies from Co-op America.
• Organic Beverages for Your Green Wedding – ok yeah, for a wedding, but LOTS O’ ideas.
• Serve organic beer and organic mixers only.

What are you planning for St. Paddy’s Day?

[image via stock.xchng]

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1. Join the Our One Heart contest for a chance to win a $350 Romantic Package for 2: A little bird told me that the Avalon Hotel & Spa is apparently the greenest hotel in the Pacific Northwest – so this is perfect for tree hugging folks.
2. Choose green cleaners over conventional store bought toxic cleaners.
3. Recycle some household items.
4. Do something smart for your heart (it is American Heart Month) and the planet and join the nature gym.
5. Get the whole family outside into nature during winter.
6. Hug a tree.
7. Enjoy some solar made music!
8. Make some Organic & Natural Homemade Chocolate Covered Cherries.
9. Whip up some organic cupcakes and top them off with pretty and sweet candied flowers.
10. Have a meatless meal this week (or two or three).
11. Quit making excuses about why you can’t go green.

Coming up later today a review of Moonpads – which if you haven’t noticed, we’re currently holding a cool giveaway for.

What sort of green Valentine’s Day fun do you have planned?

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Here’s the break-down, with links if possible so that you can learn more about these topics…

• 3% of you planned to serve organic meals
• 10% of you bought fewer gifts
• 3% of you made recycled decor
• 3% of you skipped the X-mas tree
• 10% of you made homemade gifts
• 1% of you of all vote sent e-cards
• 3% of you are recycling your gift wrap
• 1% of you are using reusable bags instead of gift wrap for gifts
• 6% of you said you’d be trying everything listed to stay green
• 23% of you were going to try most of the things listed.
• 38% of you were going to do at least two green holiday

No one said that they would:

• Use eco-decorations
• Give green gifts
• Send organic flowers

Those three above are the most expensive green holiday tips, so this might be why no one voted on them. Although, if you made homemade gifts, that’s green.

Now how did you do in the long-run? Was your holiday as green as you hoped? Are there things you regret doing? Or on a more positive note, things you’re proud you did this holiday season?

New poll up soon!

[image via stock.xchng]

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In continuing with my reviews this week, I thought it would be nice to look at a holiday-minded product. On with the show…

Product: Celebrate Green! Creating Eco-Savvy Holidays, Celebrations and Traditions for the Whole Family by Corey Colwell-Lipson and Lynn Colwell

Basics: Celebrate Green is a mama-daughter book collaboration – the title is fairly self-explanatory – this is a book about all things related to green holiday celebrations.

Cost: Family friendly at only $17.95. Plus for a limited time, you can score an even better deal. “Right now when you order a copy of Celebrate Green! from our website, you can choose between a box of organic truffles from Sjaaks for one penny plus shipping or a free jar of fair trade whipped shea butter from Vintage Body Spa for nothing but shipping.” That’s a great value. Especially during the holiday season.

What I think:

There are many outward positive aspects of this book. For example, it’s printed on 100% recycled FSC certified paper, which more books should be. There’s also a highly interactive website going on for this book. Plenty of green tips, author info, and fun stuff is offered, along with a value on reader participation.

Pros:

I like how the book is set up: The table of contents is divided into seasons, and then sub-holidays under each season. Spring through winter holidays are offered and a cool section with year round holidays -such as birthdays, family reunions, and baby showers. The last section is very nice with a great big list of helpful green websites (three pages worth) and a green-smart glossary. There are also blank page sections in the back of the book where you can make notes about each season. This book is super easy to skim through and find what you need, and their index pages are actually very well done (I’m sick of poor indexes).

I like the design: The design is simple but easy to follow. The colors flow through the book in soothing sage and browns. Important information is either in a solid color block, or has a great big header; both of which really break up the text in a bite size way. Also, each holiday is clearly marked in the bottom page corner – which is nice, so if you’re flipping through spring, you’ll see where Easter topics end and Earth Day begins.

The holidays are covered well: It would be impossible to go through how they discuss each holiday, but trust me, plenty of green tips are covered for each holiday. I’m going to use Cinco de Mayo and 4th of July as examples.

In the Cinco de Mayo chapter some of the various items covered include:

• Eco issue facing Mexico in general, and how you can help.
• Organic veggie enchilada recipe.
• Paper bag pinata instructions.
• And more.

In the 4th of July chapter some of the various items covered include:

• The dish on if fireworks are green and air quality and child labor issues related.
• Alternatives to fireworks and how to safely manage them.
• Recycling bin contest idea.
• Three worthy summer eco-causes you can support.
• How to organic up your picnic.
• Choosing eco-friendly summer drinks including where to score eco-beer.
• News about tap water.
• Organic Red, White, and Blueberry muffin recipe.
• Fun family activities that don’t kill the earth.
• And more.

So, as you can see, each holiday not only focuses on the green aspects of the holiday, but also on other green issue important to the season – that is pretty cool.

Cons:

I couldn’t really find many cons about this book. My only issue is that the text is a little wordy. (Like I’m one to talk though). The intro was really long, a little too long for my taste, and there’s a back story behind almost everything in this book, and in some cases I felt they could have just offered the tip and moved on. On the other hand, some people like that kind of thing, and as noted, I’m not exactly the most succinct human ever, so… take this with a grain of salt. It is what it is.

Celebrate Green final score:

Five out of five happy trees. This is one of the most in depth green holiday resources I’ve seen. It’s also perfect for families. Very well balanced with both kid and adult friendly aspects. It’s not just for one member of the family. Also, right now, with the special deal going on, this is an extra great value for a green book. It would make a great holiday gift.

Learn more at Celebrate Green

Buy the book

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Gorgeous Dew Drop Melody Print on Silken Banana Paper - Semi-sheer banana paper with a festive crinkle and silken threads. Handmade in India.

Adorable Sock Monkey wrap on 40% post-consumer waste recycled paper. 

Moss & Pool Retro Snowflakes – printed on Eco-White, 100% recycled, 30% post-consumer waste, paper. It’s both archival and acid-free.

Flocked Wallpaper Print – beautiful paper in a variety of soft and dramatic colors. Made from recycled cotton rag from the garment industry and flocked with rayon fiber.

Erin Ruth – 60% recycled (30% PCW) wrap printed with soy-based inks. Many designs and colors to choose from.

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If you’re shipping gifts to friends and family, you can keep it green with the following tips:

Do use recycled boxes and heavy envelopes instead of buying new at the post office. Note that some shipping places don’t accept boxes with lots of oddball writing on them. You can fix this quickly with one sheet of plain brown recycled wrap.

Don’t use polystyrene packing peanuts – they work well at protecting gifts, but are a huge eco-problem because they’re made from non-renewable resources.

Do use biodegradable packing peanuts – they dissolve in water and can even be composted. Get some at U-Haul.

Don’t use old newspapers IF your gift might get ink marked. However, shredded newspaper is handy for gifts that are enclosed in a separate gift bag or box.  Shredded newspaper will provide better overall protection than crumpled, but you’ll need lots of it.

Do use this Padding Paper – it’s 100% recyclable and has a, “Honeycomb-embossed corrugated texture that gives it impact-absorbing qualities when wrapped or folded around delicate items.”

Don’t use bubble wrap, if you can help it. If you do want to use it, make sure you send your pal a note about how to reuse bubble wrap.

Do send gifts that don’t need protection. A scarf, for example is an eco friendly gift to send because it takes up less box space and needs no protection. Dishes and baked goods are going to be harder to pack up.

Don’t mail gifts if you don’t have to. If you buy online, you can ship right to the recipient. While you don’t get to pick the packaging, this does cut down on your carbon footprint.

What other ideas do you have for greener shipping and packaging?

[image via stock.xchng]

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That said, we’re going to do a boring, random name generator. Not as much fun as a video, but still, nice if you win. Two of you have won a very cool prize – the Hallmark Card Studio Deluxe 2009.

And those two winners are…

Numbers 12 and 3. In case you didn’t memorize your comment number, this would be readers Sara and Carla.

Sara’s family is keeping it green this winter by, “Making some organic treats to give as gifts to our friends and neighbors! Oh, and lately we’ve been making peanut butter/birdseed pine cones for all of our furry friends!” Carla says, “We aren’t using our heater or watering our grass. We bought extra blankets to keep warm and we will let the rain keep our grass watered!”

Very nice green tips, as were everyone’s actually. I may have to create a link love post of everyone’s comments because you’re all doing some very cool green things this year.

Congratulations to both Sara and Carla, I’ll email you asap, so be sure to check your spam filters. Thanks to everyone else who entered and left green tips. Big hugs to our prize sponsor Hallmark Software – I’m sure our winners will be able to make some amazing projects all year long thanks to this family friendly prize.

[images via Hallmark Software]

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This treehouse is easy to put together, and you don’t even need glue or scissors – everything is pre-punched. Young kids can do this with parent help. After building you can decorate with paint, glitter, nature objects, or whatever you like. After decorating, you get to play. This treehouse is big enough to use with tiny dolls (like dollhouse size).

Available at Seasons Natural Toys, a company that I’m a little obsessed with.

Post from: Tree Hugging Family