Freecycle

We've all got too much stuff. Nothing became more apparent to us during our life change of moving last year than this fact. We finally emptied two storage areas full of stuff - my stuff, our stuff, my mom's stuff - late this summer. When it arrived, I went through box after box and donated about 50-75 boxes of it to the Salvation Army. It took the poor guy about an hour to load it all into the truck, but at least maybe, all that stuff will have a new life with someone else who really wants it.
We don't do Christmas presents any longer. We send a gift of something my husband's parents need, but we ask everyone to not send us anymore stuff. We just don't have room for it anymore.
I know this is impossible for families with children, but a good suggestion was given to a parent on one of my writer's boards. The parent was talking about the waste of those big plastic play houses. A suggestion was given to either build one of wood or go to www.freecycle.com and find a used one so precious resources aren't used to produce a new one. Also, this will save one big, plastic thing from ending up in one of our landfills someday.
My husband, who worked at a landfill for over 20 years said they used to sometimes uncover newspapers that were still readable over 30 years later. Plastics are worse, they never break down.
You may not have the toys you played with as a child any longer, but chances are they're still someplace, most likely buried in a landfill.
Give your kids recycled toys this year. You will be giving them more than a toy they will forget about by next Christmas, you'll be giving them the gift of a cleaner planet.