Eco-conscious mum of two buys all of her kids’ Christmas presents second hand after climate change epiphany

A mum-of-two has said she buys her kids second-hand presents and wraps them in sustainable wrapping paper after climate reports left her with an overwhelming sense of doom.

Naomi Spirit-Hawthorne, 43, who lives in Skelmorlie, Scotland, with her husband, Derek, 45, and children, Nina, 12, and Leon, 10, was horrified when she read a UN report in 2017 that described climate change as “a threat to human wellbeing and health of the planet”.

She overturned her life to be more sustainable from that moment, transforming her family’s everyday routine to be as environmentally friendly as possible and setting up a blog to share tips with others trying to be eco-friendly.

Naomi has ditched Christmas cards for good, makes wrapping paper and gift tags, and will even use vinegar to clean her house over the festive period. However, the mum-of-two refuses to ditch her fake tree for a new one as she does not want to create any more waste.

“It’s impossible to be completely plastic free,” explained Naomi.

“My fake Christmas tree is 20 years old. I won’t get a new one until I absolutely have to, otherwise I’m just putting more plastic in landfill.

“We have to cut down our reliance. You can make small changes this Christmas that don’t break the bank and still make a difference.”

Naomi admitted her children sometimes struggle with being climate-conscious, but she is determined to safeguard their future.

“Plastic isn’t evil, we just need to stop our reliance on single-use plastics and adapt to use plant-based plastics,” she said.

“I recently heard my son and a friend going ‘oh my goodness, look at the plastic packaging on that’ – but they are also really marketed to on YouTube and TV.

“So they’ve got a real conflict going on, like, probably we all did, but I think it’s harder for them to understand it.

“If there’s something they want I’ll say, ‘I’m not going to get you that, but I’ll see if I can find a sustainable version of it,’ you know, and they accept it.

“But I think it is going to be a struggle for my daughter right now. She’s getting more fashion-conscious, but thankfully, second-hand fashion apps such as Vinted help her keep up with the latest trends.”

Reading the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report in 2017, Naomi felt a sense of doom over the world’s future.

“I was absolutely shocked that nobody was stopped in their tracks by this,” she said.

“We can already see everything that’s happening, we’ve got wildfires everywhere, crops are failing, the bees are dying out, it was insect Armageddon.

“We’re in the eighth mass extinction event and because it’s happening slowly, everybody is just blinkered to it as if it’s not happening.”

Determined to help, the mum-of-two switched to a sustainable lifestyle and even started her own blog to share her tips and tricks.

“I just thought, right, what can I do?” said Naomi.

“I can change my own family’s life and the effect of our lifestyle and help other people understand what’s happening as well.

“I started my Little Green Ways blog and started out with some really basic things like swapping out plastic containers and buying glassware.

“Harsh cleaning chemicals are pretty bad, so I swapped those out.

“I shop local for fruit and veg and always go for the options with no plastic packages, sometimes I take a bread bag and fill that with fruit because it’s much better using old packaging than buying new all the time.”

Naomi warned not to throw out your plastic for sustainable options.

“People always think I must buy lots of green stuff,” Naomi explained.

“But the biggest thing is not buying stuff… it’s better to reuse what you have, even if it is plastic, than dispose of the plastic already used and buy something new.”

Naomi’s environmental mission doesn’t rest during the festive period and the mum-of-two even buys her children second-hand Christmas presents.

She explained that less can be more, and she tries to ensure that gifts “really hit the mark”.

“I’m careful about what I buy,” she said.

“My kids don’t blink at getting a second-hand present, that’s just absolutely normal. I actually use a clothes swap for both their clothes, so second-hand isn’t a strange concept to them.

“My son’s present last year was a marble run, Gravitrax. It was second-hand and cost £22 instead of £56 new, so he knew he would get more than if he got a brand new one.

“I think a lot of the urge to buy new is that feeling that we have to keep up with other people, you’ve just got to shed that altogether.

“I don’t worry if my Christmas looks tacky or reused, I’m quite happy to have it like that.

“If we do get anything new, then it will be like really thoughtful and made from good materials like wood and very small.”

And the mum even makes her own gifts from her garden.

“I’ve harvested quite a lot of herbs from our garden this year, so I’m going to make up little jars of lemongrass and chamomile tea,” she said.

“It’s thoughtful but not wasteful and really delicious!”

And despite including some of her home-grown herbs and veg in the Christmas dinner, Naomi will get the rest of her veg locally.

“I’ll get a local veg box for Christmas,” she said.

“I’m a keen gardener and grow a lot of vegetables and herbs. One of the things that I was happiest with was my artichokes because you grow them and then they keep coming back every year.

“We always have onions and garlic; I’ve always got enough garlic for the year which is really good.”

And Naomi even wraps up her presents in sustainable wrapping paper and gift tags.

“I take brown paper and use a wooden ink stamp on it”, she said.

“My friends and I have this little tradition of sending the same bags back and forth. So for years we’ll be using the same little gift bag that we’ve picked up from somebody.

“Instead of Christmas cards I make a donation to The Ecology Trust and that obviously saves on the CO2 from the cards themselves and the CO2 from the postage.

“They will plant like 100 trees, and it will help them with various carbon offsetting projects as well.

“At some point we’ve got to think are these traditions worthwhile.

“Instead, I write a little Christmas email and make a donation to charity.”

Naomi even has an environmentally friendly cleaning solution for the festive mess.

“Vinegar is amazing for cleaning,” she said.

“You can bulk buy vinegar online, which is super cheap, and then use that and it’s incredible.

“Lemon juice is an amazing cleaner as well and smells quite nice, too.”

Naomi’s top festive eco-tips

– Re-use your old decorations: There’s no need to buy new, re-use what you already have, including wrapping paper, decorations and baubles.

– Shop local: Buy from local green grocers and good quality meat to lower carbon emissions for your Christmas lunch.

– Skip Christmas cards: Try sending a family email and donating your card money to charity, it lowers carbon emissions and helps the planet whilst allowing you to keep in touch with family and friends.

– Normalise second-hand: Make second-hand presents normal in your household, it will make Christmas shopping cheaper whilst also reducing carbon emissions and plastic use.

– Use vinegar and lemon for Christmas clean up: Don’t buy expensive and harmful chemicals. Lemon cuts through the grease, while vinegar is antibacterial and leaves a squeaky clean shine.

– Buy sustainable and thoughtful gifts: For a sustainable festive gift, you can always buy second-hand, experiences, gift vouchers for meals out, activities for kids, or even club together with family members to buy a more substantial and meaningful gift.