24 Days and Counting

As you can see by the calendar at the right, Christmas is getting closer by the second. I thought I'd celebrate with 24 easy tips to make your home festive and fun with a minimum of fuss for the holidays. Watch this space each day for something new.

Let the Season Begin

Now that Thanksgiving is behind us, it's time to begin contemplating the Christmas tree and other decor. Furbers have always been big fans of natural greenery because we love the smell and we're naturalists at heart.

For several years, Furbers have visited the same tree lot in Moraga to get our tree, our greenery and the wreath for our front door. This year we're considering a living Christmas tree that can be planted outside once Christmas is over. A visit to my friend Patrick's house in Sebastopol yesterday confirmed it for me. Patrick decorates four live trees in his house every year. He showed us the trees from years past, which are happily growing on his ten acre ranch.

I like the idea of enjoying the tree inside for a few weeks, then enjoying it outside for years, I think a live tree conveys a respect for Mother Nature that JP and I try to impart to our children in other areas of our life, and I like to have as many living plants as I can in my house to keep the air nice and clean.

Now the quest begins: how does one introduce a living tree into the house, and where does one find a living tree? As it turns out, Inhabitat is a great resource for all kinds of information on making your traditional Christmas tree more environmentally friendly, including how to care for a living tree.

In my gathering of knowledge this morning, I've learned that introducing a living tree into the house is part art part science, similar to bringing a goldfish home from the pet store.

As for where to find a tree, the National Christmas Tree Association has a very helpful list of tree purveyors throughout the US. There's a nice, long list for California. Just click here to find your state.

Almost everywhere I visited this morning reminded me that there's only 26 days left till Christmas. Perfect -- a week to find our tree, a week to transition it into the house, and a week to enjoy it inside.

Burlap. Who Knew?

I'm trying to get into the Christmas spirit, but somehow it's late in coming this year. Don't get me wrong -- I'm happy and joyful -- just not feeling like doing the the all out shopping, decorating or wrapping yet.

In an effort to force myself into the Christmas spirit, I've spent some time thinking about how I'm going to wrap my presents this year. Each year I try to choose something sustainable or reusable to minimize the waste generated from our wrapping. For the last few years I've used newspaper and magazine pages -- I love the way they look with a pretty ribbon and I want to use them while I still can! (see post "You Can't Curl Up with a Cup of Coffee and a Mac"). This year I've decided to wrap my presents in burlap. It's very chic and rustic, reusable, and made from the skin of the jute plant, a rapidly renewable natural resource.

In researching where in the world I could buy rolls of burlap (AceHardware.com), I've realized that burlap is quite the home decor trend. I saw so many chic uses of burlap, including a post from a fellow blogger Stories from A2Z on burlap in fashion entitled "Making Burlap Work for You." My favorite uses in home decor are:

Upholstery

Pillows

Lighting


The most exciting thing about burlap emerging as a design trend is this: burlap's durability and unpretentious nature are a perfect match for my three children and 100 lb. dog. I think I'll spend today making a burlap slipcover for the rattan sofa that sits on my porch. Still not a Christmas project, but getting closer.

Dreaming of a Green Christmas?

As regular Suburban Zen readers know, the Furbers strive to be as green as we can be, but we try not to drive ourselves crazy. Christmas is one of those times of year when it's a little harder than usual to be green: there's more consumption of goods, food and services, and the all the packaging and waste that goes along with that.

The book I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas: Gifts, Decorations and Recipes that Use Less and Mean More is a resource I'll be using this year to help cut through the clutter and get back to the business of making enduring memories with my family.

Here are a few ideas to get us all started: