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Sure you can buy your sweeties organic flowers or chocolate and have your children decorate Valentines made from recycled paper; however, in my family, we have another tradition. Every year for Valentine’s Day, we take the opportunity to buy a fruit tree or rose bush. What better way to express our love than to give a gift that may offset some of our carbon footprint?
I love chocolate as much as the next guy/gal, but I am not a fan of cut flowers, even though I worked in flower shop in high school. Lavish bouquets purchased to celebrate holidays have spawned a thriving industry that heavily relies on pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides. According to the Wise Geek:
Most cut flowers are grown in South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia in large greenhouse environments staffed by underpaid, non-unionized workers…Because cut flowers are grown in nations with more lax environmental laws, many banned substances including DDT and methyl-bromide are used in flower production…Some cut flowers may be shipped thousands of miles, adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere at every step of the way.
Purchasing a live plant is a great, greener alternative to cut flowers, especially when you buy a blooming or fruiting plant that will remind your family year after year of your love. Involving your children in selecting and planting the living gift will create a natural experience to accompany the gift. Anxiously awaiting, predicting, observing the plant throughout the growing season turns a Valentine’s gift into a long term nature study.
Alternatively, Oxfam is asking people this Valentine’s Day to “think outside the chocolate box”. For $40, you can purchase your loved ones a dozen baby chicks. This gift will go to a family affected by HIV/AIDS. If chicks are not your style, you can purchase a sheep, fair trade honey, or plant a garden with your donation.
For more ideas on having a green Valentine’s Day, check out Crafting a Green World.
You can read about the history of Valentine’s Day here.
Image courtesy of Oxfam.
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I like your family’s tradition of buying live plants rather than cut flowers for Valentine’s Day. GreenLivingIdeas.com has a Eco Valentine’s Day gift guide that also highlights more sustainable options. Though buying baby chicks is hard to beat.
Sigh, my guilty pleasure habit of flower bouquets is finally being broken with the knowledge that the flowers are most likely coming from far away, unsavory places. Nothing pretty about that.
I’ve been experimenting this year with putting cuttings from my fruit trees inside. They are tricked by the warm air and bloom in a vase. It is very pretty and a nice alternative to cut flowers as a centerpiece.