Christmas spending v saving the planet

HA! Hand knitted walking sticks. That would be some stiff wool!!

Eviebeanz yes it's incredible what you find. Wrapping paper and beautiful toiletry gift sets all still sealed in their original packaging.

Walking the dog last week I noticed about 20 nerf gun bullets strewn around my local park. Obviously just fired once and left behind. Two days later they were still there so I picked them up and took them to the charity shop - I wonder if they will appear in some lucky child's Christmas stocking courtesy of an eco-warrior, penny-saving Gransnet grandma?

Thank you very much for the tree planting link @Calistemon, what a perfect gift for my children.

I wrap gifts in brown paper, but I do love the idea of using 'relevant' pages from magazines, brilliant idea, off for a quick rifle through the paper recycling box.......

I've been looking for experiences rather than physical gifts. If anyone lives in West London, I was very pleased to find a 'wine tasting' club that sells vouchers so your receivee can choose which event they attend.

It is called the North Ealing Wine Tasting Society - NEWTS. They have a website and are on Facebook too. Vouchers are £20 and they have Covid 19 procedures in place. I've bought for my lifetime friend for her special 'pensionable birthday'.

Soroptimum

Help! I’d love to stop buying plastic ‘rubbish’, but my 3 grandchildren have Christmas Eve stockings at our house that I fill with that sort of stuff. They obviously have come to expect them now, so what do I do??? They are not the type of children that would appreciate adopting a goat

When my children were young I used to buy lots of bits and pieces from charity shops for their stockings; little toys, games, ornaments etc., even plastic 'tat'! That way I wasn't supporting the producers of said tat, but the charity I bought from. They loved opening their stockings!

I don’t think these need to be mutually exclusive .
Christmas is not measured in plastic tat and oversized tins of Quality Street.
There are lots of excellent ideas on here already for carefully chosen presents which will not endanger the planet.

I wish I knew someone in W London who likes wine - I really want to buy a voucher for NEWTS!

Many thanks for the suggestions. I’m off to scour the charity shops

Scrooge here. Don’t believe in Christmas. Only buy presents for under 16s so they are not disappointed - last year the youngest GD got a second hand bike. I buy presents when I see something someone I know would really like or, like this week, I feel they deserve something - GD has corvid so sent her a present to help amuse her.