This year for me has really been about trying to make as many small changes as I can. While I have been recycling for years, this year I have thought more and more about reducing and reusing where possible!
I have stopped recycling jam jars in favour of saving them and using them as I make more of my own preserves and chutneys which not only reuses the jars but also reduces the number I am buying and reduces my food waste as I put more effort into making chutneys and preserves when I have a glut of something. I have swapped cling film for reusable replacements and more tupperware. I have swapped kitchen roll for old muslins which I wash and reuse over and over again. And a zillion other small changes.
But then December started. In our house we have 2 family birthdays and Christmas, between birthday parties, hosting Christmas and all the gift giving this is easily our biggest waste producing month. Standing in the supermarket looking at wrapping paper I felt really queasy as I realised all my year long good work could go totally and utterly down the drain this month.
So I started to make a plan. This year would be different, I mean it will still be a more wasteful month than many others but there must be swaps I can make right? So this is what I am doing:
What I haven’t given up this year is the tree. We don’t always get a real one, but with the newly finished extension it was something we’d been looking forward to… so while I realise I am picking and choosing, this is my extravagance, my one big piece of waste that I hope will be offset by the other small changes.
Are you making any small swaps this year? If so please share you’re ideas… I’d love for this to be a list I can build on year on year!
-Madeleine
I have stopped recycling jam jars in favour of saving them and using them as I make more of my own preserves and chutneys which not only reuses the jars but also reduces the number I am buying and reduces my food waste as I put more effort into making chutneys and preserves when I have a glut of something. I have swapped cling film for reusable replacements and more tupperware. I have swapped kitchen roll for old muslins which I wash and reuse over and over again. And a zillion other small changes.
But then December started. In our house we have 2 family birthdays and Christmas, between birthday parties, hosting Christmas and all the gift giving this is easily our biggest waste producing month. Standing in the supermarket looking at wrapping paper I felt really queasy as I realised all my year long good work could go totally and utterly down the drain this month.
So I started to make a plan. This year would be different, I mean it will still be a more wasteful month than many others but there must be swaps I can make right? So this is what I am doing:
- I’ve ditched the gift wrap. Instead I have bought brown recycled packing paper and now every time the kids ask for paper I cut them some brown paper off the roll, they produce a beautiful unique piece of art that I then use to wrap someones gift in.
- I’ve started saving all the brown paper from amazon deliveries to use for more wrapping. And saved boxes to use as hampers
- I’ve made more jams and chutneys and even limoncello to give as gifts to fill my cardboard hampers (and will be making more perishable items nearer the time) instead of giving plastic tat that people probably wouldn’t really want anyway
- I’ve ditched Christmas Cards and going to actually send everyone personal messages instead.
What I haven’t given up this year is the tree. We don’t always get a real one, but with the newly finished extension it was something we’d been looking forward to… so while I realise I am picking and choosing, this is my extravagance, my one big piece of waste that I hope will be offset by the other small changes.
Are you making any small swaps this year? If so please share you’re ideas… I’d love for this to be a list I can build on year on year!
-Madeleine
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