Reduce, Re-Use, Recycle, Re-Gift!

It's the most wonderful time of the year.
Holidays almost over,
But friends still come over,
Unexpected cheer
I'm so glad re-gifting season is here.

There'll be parties for crashing
And tastes for the clashing and
Some gifts that just aren't a score.
So carefully repack them and
Watch it unwrap, it's the moment you
Didn't work for.

Taking credit for gifts you didn't buy
Yes, it once was a secret
Now every one gets it
There's no taboo here,
It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Happy Holidays with Love, from Eve

Gift bags for the eco-artist

I recently read that "if all American households used recyled materials to wrap just three gifts, it would save enough paper to cover 45,000 football fields."  I just love stumbling upon facts that give even more meaning to the artful endeavors I've attempted throughout the years.  For instance, I've been reusing paper gift bags (as well as carryout bags, shopping bags, etc..) for many Christmas' already.  It started with a collage art infatuation.  Before having kids, I used to sit around with old picture books, scalloped scissors and collectable stamps I'd bought on ebay and make my own greeting cards.  This evolved into very ellaborate gift bag decorating, it was really fun!  Once I learned how to effectively use Modge Podge, it was a new and limitless world! 

However, these days it seems that there is a shortage of mommy-attention in this house.  (The dishes and laundry seem to be crying the loudest.)  So, my endless hours of cutting and pasting whilest singing along to repitions of Natalie Merchant's Tigerlilly CD, have given way to a quicker simpler method for last minute decorating.  During the year, I save all paper bags that find their way to me, many of which I've given away in past years and have been given back!  (I love that!)  I also save all the Christmas cards and any other pretty postcard photos we come across.  Then at Christmas I just get out my trusty glue stick and paste a lovely postcard photo over the logo on the paper bag.  Sometimes I'll tie a little scrap of ribbon on the handle, add a bead or two... seriously this stuff is so simple.  Finally, I coat the image in Modge Podge with a paintbrush.  When it dries it has that glossy, brush stroke finish to it that exuberates !art!!

Pet Peeve: The aisles in the craft store that sell "scrapbooking materials".  I know this stuff is cute and all, but I think it actually mutes some very beautiful inate qualities, like being able to gather some old junk and  turn it into something lovely.  Women have a strong gathering instinct, and a strong creation-drive (keep it in the kitchen, girls).  Making your own Christmas gift bags this year is a simple, eco-friendly way to satisfy your creative impulse.

Trim A Tree For Wildlife

Who is the one person you would never want to play in a poker game?  Martha Stewart...? Me too!  I just can't read her.  She's got a perpetual-poker face.  Or maybe it's that with her amount of croissant-capital she could clean me out of mydough in a single bluff.  However, despite her intimidating wealth and impenetrable exterior, when I open the pages "A Martha Stewart Christmas", I feel we are twin souls.  I've been called the "younger, funnier, vegan-version of Martha Stewart"... okay, only once... and by me.

For many people, the holiday meals are all about the bird.  We love birds!  Especially my young son, who, thanks to Martha's instructions on how to decorate a tree for wildlife, has made this craft a yearly tradition of providing local winter birds with their own holiday meal.

Tangent alert: My son's infatuation with birds began two Easters ago when he received a basket of plastic eggs filled with treats.  After emptying the treats out onto the floor, he nestled them back into his grass-filled basket and carried them around with him for the entire day.  This was also the grand opening week of our local IKEA store and our first visit as a family: Pregnant Mommy, Daddy, Son, and basket of "Baby Eggs".  A year and a half later, he still checks in on his baby eggs and pretends that they will someday hatch.(more on this heartwarming tale in the spring.) End tangent.

For now, it's almost winter and cold enough outside to slow the activity of our favorite feathered entertainers.  So, to show our appreciation for their delightful presence, we strung up popcorn and decorated the blue spruce outside our window.  And per Martha's advice, we also filled little orange-halve-baskets with birdseed and hung them from the tree with biodegradable (hemp) string.  Then we rolled pine cones in peanut butter and then again in more birdseed which we also hung with hemp on the tree branches.  My favorite and most colorful decorations though, were dried fruit slices (apples and oranges) that we strung up and used to garland our wildlife gift tree!  We dried our own fruit slices in the Excalibur, but if you don't have a food dehydrator, a low oven setting will work fine.

I'm sure your family will enjoy giving this gift to your local winter birds.  But, don't be disgruntled if a sticky-toed squirrel snatches your orange cup and high-tails it (oh, that's what that means!) across the yard, up the neighbors ramp fence and out of sight, because... wouldn't you?

More instructions on decorating trees for wildlife can be found here.

Grow your own houseplants from kitchen scraps

An avocado pit is a wondrous thing to a four year old who is just discovering seeds.  "Can we plant it?" my son's eyes were as big as the huge round shiny seed.  His youthful enthusiasm often snaps me out of my habitual thinking patterns and gives me a peek into a world infinite potential.  "Maybe" I sincerely replied.  We dried the seed and placed it in the seed-sorting tray that he made that week: washed out condiment cups from our recent carry-out order, glued to a strip of construction paper.  This tray contained all the hope and vision of a child's backyard Eden: orange, grapefruit, date, tomato, squash, pumpkin, marigold, zinnia; every seed of every piece of produce that crossed our cutting board, and every seed of every spent flower we passed on our walks and every spinning helicopter seed from every ash and maple tree that his little hands could carry.  I felt a little apprehensive at the thought of being responsible for all of their fruition!  (A secret between you and me... I do not have a green thumb!)

I hoped that seed collecting was a fulfilling project in itself for my young son, until the next week when he asked "Mommy, when are we going to grow that avocado tree?"  I wasn't surprised that he remembered, after all "I'm an elephant." he proudly and routinely proclaims.  So, I put aside my afternoon chores, (like I always readily do!) and we set off to the book store to see what we could learn about growing seeds.

As serendipity would have it, the book I found in the "green features" section, seemed like it had been written just for us!  Don't Throw It, Grow It! 68 Windowsill Plants from Kitchen Scraps written by Deborah Peterson & Millicent Selsam.  My son was not surprised, because of course, you go to the bookstore and they have exactly what you need there but I was experiencing the magic of following my child's curiosity to it's fruition.

On the way home we purchased a small bag of sphagnum moss from the local craft supply store.  At home, we dampened a handful of the moss slightly and nestled the seed inside.  Then we placed this "baby bird egg inside it's nest!" in a small ziploc bag which we then sealed and (like a real bird's egg would've been)placed in a warm dark spot (a shoebox on top of the dryer.)

Not being an elephant myself, I soon forgot about our nestled avocado seed while it set about silently germinating in my laundry room.  About six weeks later, I happened to be cleaning off the top of the clothes dryer when I found the box.  Sure enough, the seed had split open and an inch long sprout was curling upward while three inch long roots searched tenderly for soil.  We put the sprouted seed in a pot one inch larger in diameter than the seed and buried it halfway in soil, as the book instructed.  Since then our little friend has been eagerly stretching skyward (toward our overhead kitchen sink light).  Avocado plants grow rapidly, this one has already outpaced the grapefruit seedling that my husband and son planted six months earlier.

Houseplants are great for keeping indoor air clean.  I sometimes buy them from the off-season clearance rack.  Our introduction to growing our own however, has been fun and fulfilling.  Give it a try!