Is anyone else trying to have a less wasteful Christmas this year?

[GrinchWithAConscience]

Every year there’s a new Christmas craze, this time it’s Labubu toys and White Fox, last year it was Stanleys and skincare.

It just makes me sad seeing how much of it ends up as waste or forgotten tat. Wouldn’t it be better if kids got things they genuinely like and will use, instead of whatever’s trending for five minutes?

I really wish more people would pause and think about what all this buying actually means, for the planet and for the kids themselves.

Just opt out, and few people where I work opted out and no one thinks anything of it, it's just another gift to stress about buying

A few*

Yes, reusable wrapping paper. My family don't like it as I keep asking for it back 🤣

Oh now shush, that live and let live attitude with a dash of self awareness is not welcome here!!

Sounds much like us. I love Christmas but there’s no need to go mad, and except for token edibles, except for dds we stopped doing adult presents a couple of years ago. Dh and I still do each other, but it’ll be something wanted or needed. Waste of food really bothers me, so although we have everything we want, it’ll all be eaten by NYE.

As for wreath workshops, I just buy an unadorned fresh green one in the local market, add a red ribbon and a few bits - looks fine. Always a real tree, but the decorations come out every year, and some of them go back decades,

When my dc were small I was so caught up in the piles of plastic tat and making Christmas amazing for them with lots of toys, as they got older I realised how wasteful it all was, a lot got broken and ended up in landfill. Toys are just not built to last, they are built to be thrown away (or a lot are). We did try and buy wooden toys when they were younger shut those things hurt when thrown.

Now I just hate seeing all the toys in the shops, the amount/variety compared to when we were kids is just huge and most are made from plastic. I always look at the stuff in shops and wonder how much will end up in landfill.

I think it’s easier to be environmentally friendly when you don’t have small children. Now mine are grown up a lot more thought goes into what I buy and where it’s going to end up. I do have family members that still buy us things that will end up broken or in landfill (I would rather not have a gift at all). We think carefully about everything including packaging, wrapping paper and tape. We tend to buy food for relatives unless there’s something they have specifically asked for. We prefer to spend money on days out, attraction passes or cinema tickets rather than physical things.

This year I am cutting back with present buying and cutting out a few people (mainly the ones that never say ‘thank you’ and never buy for us). I will continue to use wrapping paper as I love wrapping gifts, I always make sure it’s recyclable paper and tape (or I remove the tape so the paper can be recycled). We won’t be doing many Christmas cards this year, just close family.

The bit I struggle with is the Santa gifts/gifts from us.
As children they are conditioned from TV, books and us that they get a pile of stuff.
Ill have a 6yr old and 4yr old this Xmas and I want to reduce the expectation. I remember last yr my eldest was like 'is there any more presents for me? How many will I get?" Etc etc and I took remember being like that as a child.
It's hard to curb the expectations of piles of gifts

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I mean... we can't afford to buy many gifts. Bare minimum for kids, and all the adults are doing a giant £20 Secret Santa to minimise cost. So I suppose yes? Seeing as the office is shut and we have to use our holiday being off, I plan on using the time to catch up on housework 🎅🔔🥳

💗💗💗

Sad to hear you have gifts to buy and short of cash. Are these adults or children? I would stop buying adults apart from your son.

I hope it's better than you expect.

No I’m not doing less this year. I can’t think of anything we are being wasteful on that I’d get away with trimming. We do a secret Santa- one gift each. Apart from that it’s eating and drinking with the usual good humour. Kids get a money transfer to buy whatever they want, no need for me &dh to guess and get it wrong. I’d get rid of secret Santa but I lost the vote.

According to op skincare is a craze.

It just makes me sad seeing how much of it ends up as waste or forgotten tat. Wouldn’t it be better if kids got things they genuinely like and will use, instead of whatever’s trending for five minutes?

How are toys kids want today any different from what kids wanted in 1950? The same toys popular then are popular now, dolls, cars, mr potato head and more. It’s the same with crazes, well at least since the 1800s. Are you saying there was never ever a toy you desperately wanted op?

Who is anyone to says what we decide to buy our children is tat?we recycle toys, regift, hand down donate, some things have been secured and stored in the loft to pass on.

It always amazes me how narrow minded people are about Christmas and gifts, just because you don’t like it, won’t use it dosnt mean others won’t.

There are lots of ways to start a post about how people make their Christmas’s purposeful and produce less waste for themselves without criticising other peoples way of doing things and accusing them of buying tat.

Am actually spending money on me this year after 30 years of treating my family.
Going to Australia mid November to see my son so costing a lot of money.
Family are getting about £100 each on presents and husband in charge of wrapping and making the house look festive when I get home.
I feel selfish but this trip is me time with son I haven’t hugged for 2years !

Why oh why is it almost Christmas again!!??how?? It was yesterday!!

Im so old my life is flashing by 😭

That's so kind. It's mainly adults. There are only two children in our family and they live abroad. I suppose one of my main pleasures has been choosing gifts but this year I will have to cut back. It's changing habits and expectations that's hard. But thank you!

I'm trying to declutter. I have a pile of large sheets of brown paper, inherited about 30 years ago. This year it will be used for wrapping family presents.

We have slowly gotten better over the years. I do try to focus on quality over quantity, but there's always room for improvement.

We have never gone in for massive piles of presents. Some of the toys we've bought for DDs in the past haven't ended up getting played with which is a shame but they were bought with good intentions and were on their Christmas lists. We now set a budget of £100 for each of them, to include their stocking so that even if something ends up not being quite right we haven't wasted loads of money. As they get older it is becoming easier as they're not moving onto a new fad every two minutes.

We have reusable drawstring gift bags that I bought about 5 years ago and are still going strong. They'll last for years I expect. I also save gift bags we're given so buy very little wrapping paper. I tend to just buy one or two rolls a year of a red, gold or silver paper that says it is recyclable so it can do for birthdays as well as Christmas if I don't have a recycled gift bag that I can use.

Our artificial Christmas tree isn't great for the environment but is ten years old and we have no plans to change it. We use the same decorations each year.

We no longer have Christmas crackers.....now they are a complete waste!

I probably buy too much food but do try to make a note of what got eaten and what didn't each year, particularly for the buffet we host for extended family because that can get expensive. I'm also guilty of using foil trays to cook Christmas dinner.