Around the holidays, everyone wants to live lavishly. It’s a time to spend money, to dress up, to decorate your house and to be generally generous. There’s just one issue: we end up taking a lot from the environment. And that doesn’t promote that warm feeling we desire at the holidays. Here’s how to prevent the backlash:

Green the décor

Ever have a blackout on your street close to the holidays? You can most likely blame the seriously lit up home with the dancing Santa.

Don’t be that home, and substitute in LED lights for your regular holiday lights. They get their energy from semiconducting material—just like watches do—and are 90% more efficient than traditional lights.

A Department of Energy Study discovered that if every single residence employed LED lights around the holidays, enough energy to power 200,000 houses for a year would be saved.

Don’t worry-these lights still shine vibrantly enough to attract some charming carol singing to your doorstep (of course a lot of of them make me want to say “go home, look up a singing instructor in LA and come back later).

Go Vintage

Did you know that the averagel American tosses out over 68 lbs of garments and clothing material per year, contributing to 4% of our solid waste?

To add insult to…piling mounds of waste, cotton crops make up a 25% of the pesticide use in the U.S.

Explore vintage and consignment stores this year. Many of them are very high end, only accepting brand-name clothest, and dry cleaning all of their items before putting them out on the shelves. If you’re up for a thrift shop, even better: these all donate their proceeds to charities, shelters, hospitals and other worthy programs like after school programs that offer singing lessons in LAand other inner city areas for kids. My friend is a voice coach in LA and volunteers at those programs.

An Even Greener Tree

Did you know that it takes 7 to 10 years to grow a Christmas tree? And how long does it end up standing in your home? Perhaps a month at most.

Opt for a live potted tree. These can be re-planted throughout the year. If you really want to buy one, patronize a seasonal tree lot as these tress are harvested on farms rather than torn out of forests.

Whatever type of tree you decide to get, do not toss it out! Grind it up and use the chips for mulch in a garden, on walking or riding trails, and even for erosion barriers on a beach. If you don’t want to do the grinding, let your wholeentire tree sink to the bottom of a lake or pond where fish can take refuge in it.