When you have finished eating all your chocolates and cookies, keep the tins and reuse them as storage containers.

Take any unwanted gifts to a Goodwill location or list them on sites like eBay or Craigslist.

Don’t throw your wrapping paper in the garbage or fireplace.  More than 8,000 tons of wrapping paper will be used on presents, using the equivalent of 50,000 trees. Reuse or recycle it!

Did you know? One disposable coffee cup per day creates 23 pounds of waste per year?

Lowering the temperature 3-5 degrees can save you up to 20% on heating costs.

Make your own food based gifts such as cookies, cakes or truffles. You could also make your own flavored organic olive oil, adding dried chillies, garlic or herbs.

If you are buying toys or electrical goods that need batteries, buy rechargeable ones, then add a battery charger to your shopping list.

Send a holiday e-card instead! There are lots of sites offering free holiday e-card services.

Buy recycled wrapping paper and holiday cards. Around 744 million holiday cards are sent each holiday season. If all these were made from recycled paper, it would help to save the equivalent of 248,000 trees.

Buy cards made from paper (not plastic) and without lots of added decorations, as these cards cannot be recycled.