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Last Minute shopping and Treecycle
by JANE BOGNER
SUNDAY, December 17, 2006

Don't panic, you still have eight days to finish your holiday shopping. This is the toughest week of the year to be green. My advice is to sit down, grab a cup of tea, a pen and piece of paper and make a green list before heading out the door.

Most of us have everything that we need so when purchasing a non-essential item, weigh its long-term usefulness and end-of-life possibilities. How long will the gift be used? Can the gift be repaired, donated, recycled or will it end up in the trash?

If you are giving an electronic item such as a computer or television, include a list of places that will recycle the old ones or a handmade certificate volunteering to take the item to a recycler. Current E-Waste recyclers are listed on the Solano County web site www.recycle-guide.com.

About 40 percent of all battery sales occur during the holiday season. Buy rechargeable batteries along with a battery charger to accompany your electronic gifts. This is a good thing since Americans throw away more than 2.5 billion one-use batteries each year. All batteries are banned from the landfills. You can recycle used household batteries at VALCORE Recycling or Vallejo Garbage Service.

Shop local

Small businesses have made the commitment to our local economy. Antique and consignment stores are the ultimate in reuse and our city benefits in tax revenues and a cleaner environment as you will drive a shorter distance.

A basket of fruits, vegetables, nuts and flowers from our downtown farmers market is practical and wonderfully fresh. There is a new gardening store downtown on the corner of Georgia and Sonoma. Everything Green Hydroponics carries supplies for indoor soil-less gardening and a line of organic soils, compost, fertilizers and less toxic pest control products. They will even order a compost bin for you.

WRAPPING IT ALL UP

Wrapping paper is almost impossible to recycle so consider some of these alternatives.

1. Design your own gift wrap using a paper bag and adding your own art work.
2. Reuse the gift bags or boxes that you received last year.
3. Add a large fancy bow on hard to wrap gifts.
4. Hide large gifts and give the person a card with a clue to its location.
5. Little gifts can be put into personalized Christmas stockings without being wrapped.
6. Wrap gifts in fabric, scarves, foreign newspapers, maps, old posters, pages from a child's coloring book, or old sheet music.
7. Think outside the box: baskets, reusable containers, or fruitcake tins.
8. Make a present in a present. For example, jewelry in a wooden box or kitchen utensils in a kitchen towel.
9. Finish with the ribbon and bows from last year and add other reusable items such as hair bows, ornaments, shoe laces, lace, or yarn with a few beads, buttons or dried flowers.

When you do go shopping, don't forget to take along your cloth shopping bag.

LIVING TREES

It is time to bring in your living Christmas tree. To help with the transition, spray the tree with water before bringing it in. Trees require up to one gallon of water every day and should only be inside in a cool area away from heater vents for a week.

When you take your tree outside, spray it with water and place it in a protected spot for 12 days to allow the tree to acclimate. You can leave your tree in its large pot so that you can use it next year after careful summer feeding and watering.

TREECYCLE
Watch this paper or go to www.recycle-guide.com for Treecycle information throughout Solano County.

VALCORE Recycling Board Member Jane Bogner's "A Sorted Affair" is published every other week in the Times-Herald, Community Outlook Section. For recycling information call her at 645-8258 or visit www.VALCORErecycling.org.

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