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I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas: Gifts, Decorations, and Recipes that Use Less and Mean More
This holiday season, Anna GettyGÇöenvironmental advocate, writer, television personality, chef, mother, and organic living expertGÇöhelps families reduce their carbon footprint and save money without sacrificing style or tradition. Anna advises how to best choose a tree (real or fake?), mitigate the negative effects of necessary travel, recycle post-holiday, and more. She shares favorite holiday recipes for organic appetizers and homemade craft ideas such as pinecone wreaths and recycled sweater pillows. With inspiring photographs, extensive resources, and advice from the 'Lazy Environmentalist' Josh Dorfman, Seventh Generation's Jeffrey Hollender, and other leading eco-experts, families might just find that these tips help them stay green all year longGÇöthe perfect New Year's resolution!
180 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
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December 19, 2011The author offers many ideas for decorations, food, and kid-friendly activities for the holidays that celebrate the season, while being less wasteful and better for the environment. The artichoke dip, salt dough ornaments, and the hefty resource guide were my favorite parts of this book. -Kelly M.H.
December 15, 2009
Another pick-up from the library that prompts the question: why are books about "green" lifestyles so very lame? Decorations made out of used tea bags painted with gold tempera paint? Really? Truffled goat cheese macaroni and cheese, how is that "green" exactly? Recycled cashmere pillows? Pomegranate antioxidant cocktail? Sigh. Every once in awhile there's a reasonable tip, like buy 2nd hand toys for your kid but hey, I already do that.I guess it's good for people who aren't already cheap and recycle a lot.
February 21, 2021
I appreciate the intent of this book, but the tips, projects, and recipes it contains leave something to be desired. While this may have to do with when the book was published (2009), I don’t know if its advice was novel even then. Many of the projects include floral wire and metallic paint, which seems to have more to do with the author’s personal taste and skill set when crafting than unleashing the creativity of readers. Some of the recipes sound delicious, but call for hard-to-source or expensive ingredients. Both the projects and recipes also require people to buy supplies, rather than use what they already have at home. Overall, I would’ve enjoyed more of a focus on innovation and accessibility.
January 4, 2022
Liked the matchbox gift idea which I adapted to give earrings to pals.
December 28, 2009
I'm Dreaming of a Green Christmas / 978-0-8118-6767-2
This collection contains a little bit of everything for Christmas - crafts, decorating ideas, and recipes - all overlaid with a lot of good green advice. Whether or not it's worth the price of admission, however, is going to be up to the reader - I enjoyed this book immensely, but it's admittedly not flawless.
The recipes scattered throughout this book are probably the least green facet of this book - as delicious as "Truffled Goat Cheese Macaroni and Cheese" looks and sounds, it seems a bit excessive to insist on 'real' Italian truffle salt shipped all the way from, you know, Italy (although the supposedly "more sustainable" option given is to "order fresh truffles from Oregon, leave out the truffle salt, and shave fresh truffles right onto the mac and cheese"). I'm not sure where the Foodie craze and the Green craze intersected so indelibly - it must have been along the organic food lines (tastes better for the Foodies, more green for the Greenies) - but sometimes the two make strange bedfellows. Still, you've gotta eat and most of the recipes in this book sound interesting, if usual to my ears (are "Prosciutto and Goat Cheese-wrapped Figs" sweet or savory or both?), and almost all are accompanied by lovely color photos of the finished product. And I really can't wait to try "Parmesan and Yeast Flake Popcorn" on the tree this year.
The decorating tips are very lovely, although I tend to be a little ambivalent about the "Green Decor" trends coming out these days because they seem to largely revolve around decorating your house with re-purposed, retro-kitch stuff, when I tend to prefer a more minimalist "just decorate LESS" approach to the green question. Still, that's largely a personal preference, and if you DO like the retro-kitch re-purposed look, there's a lot of good tips here like "Bottle Cap Refrigerator Magnets" and "Tea Bag Ornaments". I do like the "Twig Star Ornaments", for that matter, and intend to try those out soon.
As far as the crafts go, there isn't a whole lot here, but what is included is very lovely. I'd rather have a dozen or so good, creative, attractive projects than three dozen crummy ones, and this book delivers in that regard. I really like the "Herb Wreath" (for herb garden enthusiasts), the "Recycled Cashmere Pillows" (for sewing machine owners), and the "Recycled Wool Wreath" (for everyone) projects. Each project contains a lovely color photo of the finished project, but there are no "in between steps" photos or drawings, so these crafts really aren't for beginners. I think most people could stumble through them just fine, depending on your level of craft proficiency, but it's worth noting that this isn't really a beginner's book on crafting of any kind.
The real beauty in this book is the wealth of really carefully researched and thought-out green advice. It's hard to find a green book that really acknowledges the difficulties in deciding between the various "green" options out there, and this book provides a wealth of information on careful topics such as real trees vs. fake ones, shopping for presents online or in person, and the types of dishes, napkins, and other consumables best used for large gatherings. Each discussion is carefully explained, and alternatives are presented - for instance, for large gatherings, washable dishes are best but if you really must use disposable dishware, then invest in disposable bamboo plates, and so on. It's really nice to see a green book that explains *why* each option is better, and allows you to customize that advice for your own situation - it's definitely being taught how to fish as opposed to just being handed lunch for the day, and I appreciate it immensely.
A common criticism leveled at green books is that a *really* green book would make all this information available online and wouldn't clutter up the world with more books, but I think this particular book will weather this criticism well. There's so *much* here, and it's all packaged so nicely - it would be hard to track down all this advice, all these exotic recipes, and all these crafting and decorating tips elsewhere. If I had one other criticism to level, it's that I wish this book had gone more the "winter holidays" route rather than "Christmas" - there's absolutely nothing here that's overtly 'Christ' oriented (no nativity scenes made from re-purposed plastic bottles) and pretty much everything here will apply to any major winter festival, regardless of religious orientation, so it seems odd that the publishers would slap "Christmas" in the title when all this stuff would work equally well for Jewish and Wiccan winter-celebrators as it will for Christian ones. But that doesn't make the book bad, it's just odd. Overall, I enjoyed this book, and I do recommend that you at least take a look if you get a chance.
NOTE: This review is based on a free Advance Review Copy of this book provided through Amazon Vine.
~ Ana Mardoll
This collection contains a little bit of everything for Christmas - crafts, decorating ideas, and recipes - all overlaid with a lot of good green advice. Whether or not it's worth the price of admission, however, is going to be up to the reader - I enjoyed this book immensely, but it's admittedly not flawless.
The recipes scattered throughout this book are probably the least green facet of this book - as delicious as "Truffled Goat Cheese Macaroni and Cheese" looks and sounds, it seems a bit excessive to insist on 'real' Italian truffle salt shipped all the way from, you know, Italy (although the supposedly "more sustainable" option given is to "order fresh truffles from Oregon, leave out the truffle salt, and shave fresh truffles right onto the mac and cheese"). I'm not sure where the Foodie craze and the Green craze intersected so indelibly - it must have been along the organic food lines (tastes better for the Foodies, more green for the Greenies) - but sometimes the two make strange bedfellows. Still, you've gotta eat and most of the recipes in this book sound interesting, if usual to my ears (are "Prosciutto and Goat Cheese-wrapped Figs" sweet or savory or both?), and almost all are accompanied by lovely color photos of the finished product. And I really can't wait to try "Parmesan and Yeast Flake Popcorn" on the tree this year.
The decorating tips are very lovely, although I tend to be a little ambivalent about the "Green Decor" trends coming out these days because they seem to largely revolve around decorating your house with re-purposed, retro-kitch stuff, when I tend to prefer a more minimalist "just decorate LESS" approach to the green question. Still, that's largely a personal preference, and if you DO like the retro-kitch re-purposed look, there's a lot of good tips here like "Bottle Cap Refrigerator Magnets" and "Tea Bag Ornaments". I do like the "Twig Star Ornaments", for that matter, and intend to try those out soon.
As far as the crafts go, there isn't a whole lot here, but what is included is very lovely. I'd rather have a dozen or so good, creative, attractive projects than three dozen crummy ones, and this book delivers in that regard. I really like the "Herb Wreath" (for herb garden enthusiasts), the "Recycled Cashmere Pillows" (for sewing machine owners), and the "Recycled Wool Wreath" (for everyone) projects. Each project contains a lovely color photo of the finished project, but there are no "in between steps" photos or drawings, so these crafts really aren't for beginners. I think most people could stumble through them just fine, depending on your level of craft proficiency, but it's worth noting that this isn't really a beginner's book on crafting of any kind.
The real beauty in this book is the wealth of really carefully researched and thought-out green advice. It's hard to find a green book that really acknowledges the difficulties in deciding between the various "green" options out there, and this book provides a wealth of information on careful topics such as real trees vs. fake ones, shopping for presents online or in person, and the types of dishes, napkins, and other consumables best used for large gatherings. Each discussion is carefully explained, and alternatives are presented - for instance, for large gatherings, washable dishes are best but if you really must use disposable dishware, then invest in disposable bamboo plates, and so on. It's really nice to see a green book that explains *why* each option is better, and allows you to customize that advice for your own situation - it's definitely being taught how to fish as opposed to just being handed lunch for the day, and I appreciate it immensely.
A common criticism leveled at green books is that a *really* green book would make all this information available online and wouldn't clutter up the world with more books, but I think this particular book will weather this criticism well. There's so *much* here, and it's all packaged so nicely - it would be hard to track down all this advice, all these exotic recipes, and all these crafting and decorating tips elsewhere. If I had one other criticism to level, it's that I wish this book had gone more the "winter holidays" route rather than "Christmas" - there's absolutely nothing here that's overtly 'Christ' oriented (no nativity scenes made from re-purposed plastic bottles) and pretty much everything here will apply to any major winter festival, regardless of religious orientation, so it seems odd that the publishers would slap "Christmas" in the title when all this stuff would work equally well for Jewish and Wiccan winter-celebrators as it will for Christian ones. But that doesn't make the book bad, it's just odd. Overall, I enjoyed this book, and I do recommend that you at least take a look if you get a chance.
NOTE: This review is based on a free Advance Review Copy of this book provided through Amazon Vine.
~ Ana Mardoll
January 6, 2016
Beautiful photographs and a few unique ideas for holiday festivities involving less electricity, retail, and frantic-ness. The layout was a bit baffling to me though, with recipes scattered throughout every section instead of gathered up into one place. The 5 areas covered are:
1. Nesting (aka decorating your home)
2. Entertaining
3. Trimming (all things related to the tree)
4. Giving
5. Reflecting (including ways to recycle and compost after the holiday)
The recipes all look really yummy. And even though I didn't make anything specifically from this book, I felt somewhat inspired by it. Would check it out again from my library.
1. Nesting (aka decorating your home)
2. Entertaining
3. Trimming (all things related to the tree)
4. Giving
5. Reflecting (including ways to recycle and compost after the holiday)
The recipes all look really yummy. And even though I didn't make anything specifically from this book, I felt somewhat inspired by it. Would check it out again from my library.
March 11, 2010
Too many old ideas - carving a design into a halved raw potato and using it to stamp brown paper bags for wrapping paper - that was in my Brownie Handbook in the 1950's. So, I'm too old for most of the clever suggestions. The six page directory of websites was the most interesting feature of the book. They are eco-friendly/organic/locavore/recyle/green/alternative/biodegradable... did you know you can rent a live Christmas tree in Portland , OR and the service includes delivery and pick-up?
October 22, 2011
The only thing I found clever in this book was the title. The environmental information is the same as most green books I have read and I thought the craft/gift ideas to be boring. I doubt any child will want to find bottle cap magnets as their gift this Christmas. The most disappointing aspect is that on every decorating idea was something that required store bought ribbon/beads/glue. There are much better green books out there.
October 16, 2011
Christmas is my favorite time of year, so I like planning ahead. This book contains a little bit of everything on how to have a "green" Christmas by using less waste. There are some great ideas for decorations, entertaining, gifts, as well as some yummy recipes. I think I will definitely be giving the chai hot cocoa and apple, cranberry, and brie quesadillas a try!
December 3, 2009
Fairly simple craft ideas, unique recipes (the Chai Hot Cocoa sounds delicious), and lots of expert advice on how to create a more environmentally-friendly holiday. It may inspire you to get into a festive mood and try something new.
February 17, 2011
This book had me until the decorated used tea bags - yeah, that's taking green to the extreme....
November 23, 2015
Not really worth reading. The only good idea I found was to take Christmas cookie cutters and use them to trace gift tags from last year's Christmas cards. That sounds like a cute way to recycle.
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