It is hard to avoid plastic, particularly when planning small or big celebrations and friends or family gathering. There is too little time at disposal and way too much on our plates and the easiest option is often single use plastic, if not in the content, in the packaging.

Plastic is commonly recognized as bad for the environment as well as for our health (it is proven that chemicals used in plastic can migrate into the products we are consuming), thus we would like to give you few ideas on how to reduce the use of plastic this Christmas:

Stay local: buy seasonal and local products from your local farmer markets, bring your shopping bags with you and fill them with local goodness;

Decorations: reuse the décor of the previous years. It helps creating a sense of tradition and, to add a novelty, you can decorate your Christmas tree and centrepiece with homemade cookies, fruit, nuts, silk ribbons, paper cut snowflakes, green leaves and shells which make beautiful natural décor. Simple ornaments strung with dried citrus, dried apples, ribbons and cinnamon sticks will look stylish and will leave no trace behind.

Christmas Cards: online cards are a lovely way to send greetings with no waste. If you love the charm of a hand written note, our preference is for seeded paper cards that bring your message and can be planted in a garden or a pot to then grow into flowers or herbs.

Christmas tree: buy a live Christmas tree and, after the celebrations, return it to any organization replanting them in reforestation projects. Or hire a tree: live, potted trees can be rented or bought from a number of organisations, try also your local nursery or farmers market.

Wrapping gifts: invest in few beautiful large wooden boxes, wicker chests or jute bags and place them under your tree ready to be filled with gifts for your loved ones. They are a beautiful decor and can be reused endlessly for any other gift occasion whether it is for birthdays or future Christmases. With the time, just the sight of the chests will create the feeling of festive expectation. For gifts to give away, the simple brown paper is elegant and eco-friendly and can be elegantly decorated with jute twigs or ribbons and a green leave.

Choice of gifts: our suggestion is that less is better. Children can be overwhelmed by too many gifts to unpack: to reduce the number of gifts is often a way to make sure they get to enjoy their gifts. Adults often have too much of everything, thus, unless you know there is a very special wish, offer to spend time together, to babysit their children, to bake them a cake, write them a poem; just keep it minimal, meaningful and personal and it will be very appreciated.

And if you receive gifts that you will not use, consider donating them:

http://www.secondchancetoys.com.au/ collects unwanted toys to redistribute them to children in need.

http://www.givenow.com.au helps you to find social enterprises and organisations looking for donations.

To care for the environment is a journey and it can be disheartening at times, we might wonder whether our efforts really make a difference, when it appears that so many do not care that much. When I am discouraged, I remember that each of us can make a great difference as each of our actions have an immediate impact on how much plastic is discarded into a landfill and as each of our efforts become part of a strong collective movement demanding more care for our Planet.