As with other occasions during which consumption is most conspicuous, consumers should know that there are a number of ideas that can be adopted to ensure that this year’s Valentine’s Day is not only romantic and memorable, but green as well.

The easiest idea to implement is to do away with the card entirely to reduce the amount of paper used. If this is not an option, look for cards made from recycled or acid-free paper. Those printed with soy inks are better for the environment. Alternatively, make your own paper or card, and create your own Valentine’s message. Nothing says, “you’re special” than something wholly original. One thing not to do is send a Valentine’s Day e-card or worse, an email.

What girl would say no to flowers on Valentine’s Day, or indeed, any other day? Unfortunately, most flowers are imported, creating a large carbon footprint on their way to the recipient. Additionally, such flowers might have been cultivated with the liberal use of pesticides, which bodes ill for the environment and the people who handle such blooms, which includes you and your significant other.

Instead of the darkest red roses imported from half a world away, look into flowers that have been grown locally and organically. Then again, flowers last only a while, so a better idea would be a potted plant that has romantic connotations, such as orchids or pansies, as a gift that lives longer than a week. Chocolates, too, should ideally be from organic or fair-trade sources.

Aside from that, try folding your own flowers with origami. You can reuse suitably bright colored paper to kill two birds with one stone.

A dinner date is de rigueur for most couples on Valentine’s Day. If you’re part of such a couple, an easy idea that provides a good time without causing too much harm to the environment would be to cook at home. Use local and/or organic ingredients as much as possible, and forget about having to crawl through traffic, emitting eco-unfriendly exhaust fumes as you make your way to a crowded, overbooked restaurant.

The good news for graying, but eco-conscious men and women is that there are some alternatives to chemical hair dyes. One effective method is using a tea made from dried sage leaves. This has been utilized for centuries to cover gray hair. The main draw back, however, is that this method takes several applications over many weeks to get the best results.

Sage tea for covering gray is not harsh like other dyes, but precautions should be taken by those who have recently dyed their hair or used perms or chemical strainers. A small sample of hair can be clipped from the head and tested to make sure the desired color can be achieved before embarking on a full-fledged treatment of the whole head.

To create this natural hair colorant, fill a pot of water with a quart of water and bring to a boil. Measure an ounce of dried, loose leaf sage leaves and add to the water. Let the sage leaves boil in the water for 30 minutes.

Remove the pot from the heat source. Once the water has cooled completely, strain the sage leaves from the mixture and place the sage tea in a spray bottle.

Use the spray bottle to thoroughly saturate the hair with the sage leaf tea. Let the tea sit in the hair for about ten minutes before washing the hair in the shower.

Refrigerate the remaining tea and use on the hair each day in the same manner. After a few days or weeks, hair will reach the desired color and the treatment frequency can be reduced to once a month to maintain that level of color.

Fortunately, nipping the gift-wrap issue in the bud enables you to avoid being a contributor to the extra 25% trash that appears on the curb between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. The reasoning behind this is that, while post-holiday recycling (of gift-wrapping) is good, ensuring there is less to recycle would be much better.

I’ve decided to continue using glossy magazine pages and newsprint to wrap presents. I started using paper when I had to wrap a gift at the last minute, and the only thing I had on hand was a magazine that hadn’t made it to the recycling bin. If anything, the recipient seemed to be more taken with the wrapper than she was with the gift.

Print media aside, brown paper bags also make artful wrapping material; you can scrawl or draw directly on them too. Thanks to their plainness, brown paper bags set-off a pretty ribbon very well too.

Another alternative to conventional gift wrap is fabric. Fabric is more forgiving than paper, something that would be considered a blessing if you’ve torn too many pretty pieces of scrap paper to count while trying to fold them into gift bags. All you need to do is sew 2 (or 3) sides and tie the opening closed.

Aside from your own wardrobe, from which you can finally find a use for the hideously garish outfit you thought looked nice, fabric to be used as gift-wrap can be sourced from virtually everywhere. This makes it a good way to ensure fewer fabrics make it to the landfill.

You could even do away with gift-wrapping altogether, and wrap the present inside another present made from fabric. On the other hand, if such measures prove too tiresome for you, there’s always the option of reusing containers such as coffee cans; just make them look pretty!

If you’ve invited a lot of guests over, one way to reduce the amount of food wasted is to provide smaller plates. A small plate means that people can only serve themselves a limited amount of food, and they won’t be tempted to overeat. This way, the amount of unfinished food that makes its sad way to the compost/waste bin is minimized. This is also a good measure if you’re expecting a number of children as guests. Again smaller portions means that food is finished more quickly, causing less stress to the parents of picky eaters and leading to less food waste.

Food wastage can also be reduced by simply preparing less food overall. It’s easy to become fully immersed in the spirit of the season and cook and/or buy everything you need to feed an entire village. Think about it – do you really need to break the budget in the process? Does everyone need to eat so much that the only thing they can do after that is sprawl in a near-comatose state? Of course, you have to have some idea of your guests appetites to ensure no one is disgruntled with miserly servings.

If you don’t want to appear outright stingy by serving a modest spread, send word that you’re holding a Thanksgiving potluck. Not only does this decrease the amount of shopping or cooking required, which will reduce the stress level greatly, it also makes financial sense to have others contributing to a great meal. Just remember to assign a specific part of the meal to the contributor to ensure you don’t wind up with five of the same items!

Lastly, if everyone is up for it, give the remaining food to guests when they leave. It reduces the number of times you’ll have a turkey sandwich, and guests won’t go home empty-handed.

First of all, not wearing shoes inside the house automatically reduces the amount of dirt brought into a home. Can you imagine going on a hike, and then wearing those same muddy boots throughout the house? Even if you’ve done your best to scrape off the dirt, anything that remains ground into the treads of your soles will eventually dry out and, yes, drop onto the floor.

Leaving boots outside allows the mud to dry and to be knocked out back onto the ground the next day. This means that you won’t have to expend time and effort cleaning both shoes and the floor, which may necessitate the use of cleansers that can potentially harm the environment.

Devoid of rubbish as it is, the ground is practically teeming with microorganisms that are, obviously, invisible to the naked eye. Similar to mud, why would you walk through a home wearing shoes that could very well have stepped in dried dog doo or dried sputum, and track all those germs around the house? This is the reason I find it baffling to see babies playing on floors in venues where all the grownups are wearing shoes. It would be much easier to take your shoes off, and literally park your concerns at the door.

As it turns out, wearing shoes indoors can actually bring pesticides into the home. For example, pesticides used on lawns can be brought into the home for up to 7 days after they are applied, and much of the lead dust detected in homes comes from the outside. As such, it would be easier to ensure peace of mind while at home by simply going barefoot.

Keeping the home environment green is sometimes as effortless as taking your shoes off indoors. Of course, it’s another challenge altogether if you have a tendency to go barefoot outdoors as well!

Buying certified organic shampoos and hair care products is one way to bypass most of these toxins; however, it comes with a high price tag, with many organic shampoos over $20 a bottle. Even more, you’ll still have to deal with the plastic packaging and how to get rid of it.

A simple and cheap solution is to make your own natural shampoo at home. You’ll need castile soap and baking soda. Both can be bought inexpensively in bulk, saving money and packaging. My favorite organic castile soap brand is Dr. Bonner’s. You can find it online or in most natural food stores.

To make shampoo, mix a tablespoon of the castile soap and a tablespoon of baking soda in a container. Add one cup of warm distilled water to the mixture, and stir until the baking soda has dissolved completely.

To liven up this all natural shampoo, add a few drops of an essential oil. I usually use lavender. Its aroma is calming, helping to combat stress. It also leaves hair smelling fresh. Other essential oils to consider include sandalwood, rosemary, and lemon.

When you first begin to use a natural shampoo, such as this homemade one, your hair will likely go through a detox. Since you’ve been using synthetic shampoos for years, there is going to be a build up coating your hair. It will be clean, but may feel drier or knottier for a few days or weeks. Stick with your new shampoo and it will improve.

A great way to speed up your detox and detangle your hair is to use apple cider vinegar as a conditioner. Mix one teaspoon of apple cider vinegar into one cup of distilled water. Work into your hair, let sit a few minutes, then rinse.

Container gardens are the perfect solution to such situations. The easy task of establishing one gives you the opportunity to reuse drink containers if you don’t want to buy pots right away. Soda bottles or those large milk/juice jugs can be cut in half to hold plants. The same goes for smaller drink packets or yogurt tubs, which can be used as seedling containers. A dedicated container gardener I know swears by her egg carton “nursery.”

Other gardeners make it a point to use discarded wooden crates or flower baskets, which lend a rustic charm to the resulting garden. You can place potted plants in them, or line them for direct planting, and check them periodically for deterioration. You could also repurpose empty paint cans or bleach bottles if you need larger pots, but don’t use containers that once held toxic products if you intend to eat said plants.

Container gardens are also ideal for the would-be gardener who prefers to have a tight grip on his or her environment. Aside from enjoying the freedom of selecting the potting soil you like, such gardens can be easily arranged by moving the containers to where you want them to be. Cultivating potted plants also means that you can expand the garden gradually.

Another thing I like about container gardening is its small footprint; since everything is in a container, you use less water for upkeep, although you might need to water the plants more frequently. In addition, growing plants this way means that you can move plants indoors when necessary, you can move them to where the sunlight is, and you can use them to brighten up the interior – terrariums, anyone?

You can establish a container garden virtually anywhere. If you want one on your desk, make sure you choose a small enough container and combine it with small plants, the appropriate potting soil, lining material, and drainage insert for instant cheer.

1. Call ahead to be sure that the strawberries are ready to be picked. Variations in weather and number of visitors can dramatically affect the amount of the field available for picking.

2. Bring your own containers. Farms will typically sell you a box for picking if you have forgotten your own container, but you will save that expense if you bring something to receive the strawberries. Also, bring a cooler and some ice to keep your berries cool on the ride home.

3. Exercise care with the strawberry plants. Small children and those unaccustomed to picking strawberries should start by grasping the stem with one hand and the ripe berry with another, then pulling on just the berry, protecting the main plant from force. With experience, you will learn to do this with one hand, but take care to protect the plant from damage, so it will fruit again next year.

4. Come prepared to spend some time in the patch. An extra shirt and a hat will protect you from the sun if you wind up outside for a long time; it is easy to spend a couple of hours in a strawberry patch. Old jeans or knee pads will protect your knees if you wind up kneeling on the mulching straw to do your picking. Wear clothes that you don’t mind staining with juice!

5. If you want more berries than you have time to pick, most u-pick farms will also sell berries picked that day; however, expect to get the best price on those you pick yourself, because you have done the (fun) work.

Once you get those strawberries home, process them as soon as possible to maintain as much of their sweetness as you can. The easiest way to preserve strawberries is by freezing. Hull the washed strawberries (which means removing the stem and leaf from the top of the berry), then coat with white cane sugar. Place in plastic freezer containers, label with date and contents, and put into the freezer for a burst of summer flavor next winter when you need it most.(But don’t forget to save out a large bowl of strawberries for right now!)

A discussion of “green” stain removers would be incomplete without mentioning baking soda. Used together with water and a bit of elbow grease (ahem), this is considered by many to be the only stain remover anyone could ever need, and it boasts the value-added feature of having a deodorizing action.

It can be made into a thick paste or a thin solution and left to sit on said stain for a few minutes before being rinsed away. The stain can then be washed out with a basic detergent. Baking soda, or sodium bicarbonate, works because it disrupts the carbon bonds that a stain contains, and being grainy, exerts a scouring effect that is emphasized by the detergent that follows.

A variation to the baking soda-water combination is white vinegar and baking soda. Baking soda is alkaline while white vinegar is acidic. Vinegar dissolves minerals and salts that make up a persistent stain, while the addition of baking soda results in the release of carbon dioxide. This appears as bubbles, and makes it obvious some serious stain removal is taking place, although the abrasive effect of the baking soda is probably what really helps remove the stain.

However, even if there isn’t any baking soda or vinegar nearby, not all is lost, as one can still turn to salt and lemon juice to remove stains. This combination is particularly effective for bathtub and microwave stains (non-porous surfaces). The salt abrades the surface of the stain and is alkaline, while lemon juice, being acidic, functions similarly to vinegar.

Some tout vodka as an excellent solution when you need to remove a stain caused by ink, wine, grass, or even sweat. If anything, it’s an excuse to raid the liquor cabinet, although you really should use the cheap stuff, or simply opt for isopropyl alcohol. Alcohol removes stains simply because it is an organic solvent, which dissolves grease. Being clear, it dries without a trace, although you might have some explaining to do regarding the lingering scent. Also, the efficacy of gin and rum is still being debated.

Usage of commercial stain removers has begun to weigh heavily on the conscience of those who aim to preserve the environment. “Green” stain removers, being cheap and easy to obtain, assuage this guilt somewhat.

Reduce Reducing the amount of paper waste a household generates usually entails a drastic change in shopping habits, but how many things are wrapped in paper these days anyway? Have you thought of the sleeve that comes with your morning cuppa? It’s made of textured paperboard, and is disposed of without a second thought along with the paper cup that holds said coffee.

You might think it too gauche to bring your own coffee mug to the coffee shop, although it does negate the need for a sleeve. Happily, washable coffee sleeves are ubiquitous now, and come in much more interesting colors than plain paper bag brown. Alternatively, you can make your own (or get someone with sewing skills to do it for you) out of thick fabric. Bonus green points are awarded if you source the fabric from another unwanted item.

Reuse It’s easy to reuse paper printed on only one side. We use it to make out grocery lists or to print article drafts. Sometimes, my mother uses newsprint to smother weeds. Admittedly, it can be unsightly, but it works!

The more pressing issue is glossy paper, such as those used for flyers. Recycling centers generally refuse it, and it doesn’t do well in the compost bin. The easy thing to do is to use it for a craft project. Projects to try include weaving baskets and place mats. Those who have a large stash of glossy paper and time to spare could attempt a coiled paper wastebasket.

Recycle In Malaysia, entrepreneurial individuals calling themselves “old newspaper men” make the rounds around residential areas every day. Driving battered pickup trucks or vans, they buy old newspapers, making payouts based on the height of the pile before trucking the paper to recycling centers.

However, if sending unused/unwanted paper refuse for recycling sounds like too much work for you, you can add it to compost. This only works on the premise that you have a compost pile/bin. Newsprint and non-glossy/colored paper contribute carbon to the nitrogen-rich environment created by green plant materials in compost, which prevents the compost from degenerating into a sodden, stinking pile of plain garbage.