Making it a budget friendly Christmas and holiday season

Friends of the Farm have put on their thinking caps and come up with a few ways to stretch your dollars further and still have a memorable and happy holiday season and reduce waste too! 

Here are some tips.

Gifts- agree on a $$ limit in the family or agree to buy one gift per person.  Give homemade gifts such as jams, pickles, baking, knitted or crocheted hats and slippers. Make it an Op shop gift, offer vouchers for dog walking, babysitting or housework.  Vouchers for family experiences are a great gift too.

Wrapping – fewer gifts means less paper.  Try wrapping your gifts in op shop scarves or tea towels, or make some fabric bags to pop gifts into – they can be reused each year or given as part of the gift.  One local took this a step further and now collects red and green fabric throughout the year and uses it to wrap gifts, tying it with a string bow.  Homemade gift tags are great too – maybe a school holiday activity for the children?  Making wrapping paper out of brown paper decorated with drawings or potato stamps is a fun activity too. 

Crackers- bought Christmas crackers are usually not recyclable and few people care for the tiny trinkets inside.  Try making your crackers, or instead ask everyone to find a good joke to tell at the table.  Instead of the paper hats that come in the crackers, offer the family a fun fabric hat that you can reuse from year to year.  Your rubbish bins will no longer overflow with unrecyclable rubbish!

Sharing good times and fellowship, and connecting with family and friends is at the heart of Christmas and the holiday season.

And this year, after dinner,  we can scrape those plates into our food scraps bins and throw the turkey, chicken or lamb bones in too, plus all the egg shells from the pavlova.

Friends of the Farm Food Scraps fairies have been at several events recently to share and learn great tips about using your food scraps bins smartly.

Top tips for a tidy and clean bin:

Red Bin – put your food scraps into the green bin or compost your food scraps.

Green Bin – capture your food scraps by using your pink caddie liners or simply hose the green bin out once emptied by the food scraps truck. Then leave it open to dry and air.

Benchtop Caddie – every time it is emptied, use a hot soapy wash to clean it thoroughly.

Friends of the Farm has partnered with Auckland Council for more than ten years to deliver education and waste reduction service

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