TheGoGreenBlog.com

Having trouble trying to find that special someone the best Christmas gift ever? How about going green. Here are the top 10 eco-friendly gifts to give this holiday season and lessen your carbon footprint on the environment.

1- Donation to a charity or an organization
2- Tickets to a concert, sports event, or a play at the theater
3- Fair Trade products like chocolates, coffee, or fruit
4- Organic products made from hemp, bamboo, or soy - candles, clothing, soaps, etc.
5- Gift certificate to an eco-friendly spa
6- Membership fee to a museum or an organization
7- Live plant or tree
8- Solar powered gadget
9- Homemade goods - pies, cookies, etc.
10- Reusable shopping bag (can also be used as the wrapping for another gift)

Thousands of tons of holiday wrapping paper, tissue paper, metallic and plastic bows, ribbons, etc. are purchased each season. Many trees are destroyed, and lots of chemicals are released in the production process of these decorations.

After the holidays the wrappings usually end up in the trash and sent to a landfill, where they take a long time to decompose. Or, if you were to burn them, they would give off toxic gases. Either option is not very merry for the planet.

The best thing to do if you are giving physical gifts this season is to wrap them in an eco-friendly way. You can make the wrapping a part of the gift, something that can be used for another purpose afterwards, or just use plainer wraps made from recycled materials.

Here are the top 5 green choices for holiday wrapping:
1- outdated maps, old posters, sheet music or leftover lightweight wallpaper
2- newspapers (foreign newspapers are my favorite) or the Sunday comics
3- kids’ artwork
4- old wooden wine boxes, baskets or tins
5- scarves or handkerchiefs

By making the switch to LED Christmas lights this year, you can save big money on your electricity bill, and lessen your carbon footprint on the planet. Below are the top five eco-friendly reasons to upgrade to LEDs this holiday season.

Top 5 reasons to use LEDs
1- Use 10% the electricity of incandescents, and are 90% more efficient than their old-school tungsten counterparts
2- Made with far less nasty chemicals then the tungsten bulbs
3- Never really get hot
4- Last almost forever (about 100,000 hours)
5- When one burns out, it doesn’t take the whole chain with it

Bonus Tip
6- Save even more energy & money by setting a timer

As the holiday season fast approaches, it’s time to start thinking about your Christmas trees and holiday decorations. There are many options out there, however some are more eco friendly than others.

1- Artificial
Some may think that buying an artificial tree is the most eco friendly thing to do; however that is just the opposite. Artificial trees are far worse for the environment than cutting down a real live tree. That’s because they are mainly made from non-renewable plastics, some containing PVC (Polyvinyl Chloride). While you can reuse a fake tree over and over you can never recycle it when it is time to update your holiday decor, and not to mention all the toxic chemicals that went into making it in the first place.

2- Real
On the other hand, real trees that are cut down can be recycled after the holiday season by being mulched or used for heat. You can even be super green by buying your tree from an organic tree farm and avoid all the pesticides.

3- Living
Another alternative, one of the best for the planet, is to celebrate with a living tree. This is a live tree that is potted in a planter for the holiday and then later transfer to the earth. All the holiday cheer with no guilt.

Have a happy holiday for you, your family & friends, and your planet. Look for more green holiday tips all of December.

C2C Holdings, Inc is a way cool company that was inspired by the Cradle to Cradle design philosophy and their overall goal is to eliminate the concept of waste. They do this by designing products so that their material value can be harnessed again and again in future products instead of ending up in a landfill.

Their first product line is ReProduct greeting cards and envelopes, which can also be customized to include invitations, announcements and other stationery items. ReProducts cards are made from a plastic material called OPP (oriented polypropylene) and are printed with healthy UV cured inks. Both the card material and the ink formulation have been certified to contain no toxins. This means that there are no human health risks associated with any materials in the cards. The cards are then sent to the recipient in a unique 2-way envelope (similar to Netflix) that provides pre-paid return postage back to the manufacture, Shaw Industries. When the recipient is finished with the card, they simply put the card into the return envelope and drop it in the mail. Shaw Industries then uses 100% of the cards and envelopes to create carpet backing in new carpet tiles.

Show your family & friends that you are thinking about them while still thinking about the environment - Go green & use ReProduct Cards.

Tomorrow is World Vegan Day, which has been a holiday since 1994 to celebrate the anniversary of the creation of The Vegan Society.

The Vegan Society was founded in Britain on November 1, 1944, by Donald Watson. It was the first ever society for vegans, and coined the the word vegan for “non-dairy vegetarians”.

So…celebrate with the world tomorrow and go vegan (at least for one day).

The pumpkin is one of the most eco-friendly holiday decorations out there. It is 100% natural, yet a majority of the nature gets thrown out once you’ve carved them. This autumn, don’t just throw away the flesh from your pumpkin…compost it. This simple solution to use the whole pumpkin will not only decrease the amount of material that you send to the landfill, it can also help turn your organic waste into a landscape asset.

The folks over at Earth 911 have put together one of the most extensive composting resources out there, where you can find more information on what composting means and its benefits.

If you don’t already compost at home, go green and start today!