Valentine’s Day can be a greenie’s nightmare, like any other event that’s become commercialised. There’s a lot of hype and advertising pushing for us all to buy more things to prove we love each other, and if I see one more ugly stuffed toy holding a heart, I think I’ll go mad!
But I still like to celebrate it anyway. I like the little reminder not to take a relationship for granted, and usually take the opportunity to do something simple with my husband. So what can you do for Valentine’s Day that doesn’t mean abandoning your greenie cred?
The same gift-giving principles I wrote about at Christmas apply here too. Think about what your sweetie likes; choose long-lasting quality items rather than disposable, over-packaged ones; and try to go for organic, free-range, fair-trade, and local wherever possible. As always, skipping the material gifts is an option - instead of spending money, spend time with your honey instead. So what are some green Valentines ideas? Sticking to the traditional V-day gifts, here’s what I was able to come up with:
Gifts
Chocolate: Green & Blacks and Dagoba are my favourite organic, fair-trade brands of chocolate, but there are plenty of tasty ones to choose from.
Flowers: I couldn’t find any organically-grown flowers from the major delivery services in Australia, but native arrangements are available here and here. You can ask growers at your local farmers market what their methods are, and know that at least the flowers haven’t been trucked all over the place in cold-storage. If you’ve got green thumbs, why not pick a bunch from your own garden?
Wine: there are so many organic wines available now! Check out Organicwine.com.au to find one from your region.
Diamonds or jewellery: We’re often pushed to buy diamonds for Valentine’s Day, but many of them are mined and sold to fund terrorist and criminal activities. If you do want to buy a diamond, look for conflict-free diamonds certified by the Kimberley process - Lighter Footstep blog tells you how to find out the source of diamonds. As a cooler and less traditional alternative, look into lab-created diamonds (no mining involved), or buy non-diamond jewellery from independent Australian designers like those at Modamuse or Etsy.
Cards: I’m sure there are plenty of great cards out there, but this year I’m going to get some recycled printer paper, and use it to make cards from the many free designs available online as downloads. Here’s what I’ve found so far: Samantha Hahn at Flickr, Natala at Flickr (front and inside), Organic Consumers (right-hand column), vintage kid’s cards from ValArt2008 at Flickr. Or, if you want to send a valentine to your favourite vegan or the IPCC, check out the Valentine e-cards from Grist.org .
Activities
Food: Maybe I’m just greedy, but sharing a meal with the one I love is my favourite way to celebrate Valentines Day. You could try a vegetarian restaurant, or cook an all-organic meal at home. My ideal V-day menu would be a free-range chicken from Mt Barker, roasted with local organic vegetables from the Swansea St markets; some organic wine from Serventy or Random Valley; and fresh fruit with local cream from Casa Dairy.
Help out: Do something nice for your loved one - Apartment Therapy suggests taking care of an annoying task they’ve been putting off! As the first commenter on the article points out, nothing says “I love you” better than cleaning the toilet 
Go out together: Gifts are lovely, but can’t replace spending time with your loved one, doing your favourite activity or trying something new. Picnics are fun and low-key, or you could see a movie together. Or you could change your routine and challenge yourselves, so you can rediscover what it is you enjoy about spending time with this person.
Stay in together: Of course, you don’t have to go out of the house… get some beeswax candles, some massage oil, find those chocolates and wine from earlier, and see if you can entertain each other for a while
That said, don’t forget your other loved ones for Valentines Day. Send a card to your grandparents, take your mum out to dinner, give your best friend flowers. Or take your cue from Clare at Ockham’s Razor, and celebrate Library Lover’s Day instead. There’s all sorts of love in the world, and all of it should be celebrated!
So: have you ever given an eco-friendly Valentine? Or have you got any good ideas for one? Share the love by leaving a comment about it!
Send an ecard from Care2.com, http://www.care2.com/send/catvalentine1.html
Sending a Valentine E-card generates a donation for a good cause.
This is a great blog - was nice to read something that’s so relevant for me. You’ll find the flower industry in Australia is desperately behind Organically and environmentally as a whole.I’ve read articles that claim flowers are sprayed with chemicals far worse than other crops and the chances of finding a flower that hasn’t been shipped across the country if not the world and then stored in a cool room is very slim. I own a florist and we do everything we can to be environmentally responsible - Recycled Paper, we don’t keep stock we buy to order so we don’t have wastage, recycled glass vases when we can find good ones - always high quality vases that can be used again and again not those flimsy card or plastic boxes, water conservation is very important.
Thanks for giving us some insider perspective, Claire! I’m glad to see you’re greening the rest of your business even if organics are hard to come by - hopefully you’ll find some more ideas here on the blog or the main site. (By the way, I really like your website design too, very pretty).
We are a flower grower with environmentally friendly flowers.
We can not get organic certification because we are hydroponic (the best use of our scarce water). We use otherwise organic friendly practices, organic certified crop protection products and Integrated Pest Management. Also, on farm recycling of all wastes and any other environmentally friendly practice we can implement.
Also, we are now producing much of our own growing material instead of bringing it in from overseas, which definitely reduces our carbon footprint.
Many growers we are friends with are moving towards a more chemical free approach, as is the whole flower industry, but most of the horticultural and agricultural sector in Australia may still have a way to go before getting organic certification.
I beleive that somewhere in the future a “hydro-organic” certification standard may be happenning, which allows the efficiencies and sustainability of hydroponic systems to be used with organic practices to develop a sustainable chemical free product to get certification.
Thanks for sharing your info - as always, certification is nice, but having a chat with your florist about their methods is often the best way to find out what they’re doing to help the environment.