A polytunnel can help you to provide for the needs of you and your family throughout the year. But a polytunnel can also help you to create DIY Christmas presents for all the important people in your life. A home-made Christmas gift can mean more than a present bought in the shops, and allow you to show off your home-growing and DIY skills. Here are five DIY Christmas present ideas for polytunnel gardeners:
Home-Made Jams, Chutneys and Preserves
A polytunnel can allow you to grow a wide range of fruits and vegetables that you can use to create a range of home-made jams, chutneys and other preserves that can make wonderful Christmas gifts. A little preparation throughout the year can allow you to make the most of the produce that you grow, and enjoy fresh fruit and vegetable flavours even during the coldest part of the year.
Baked DIY Christmas Presents
Frozen or otherwise preserved polytunnel produce can also be used to make a wide range of baked goods for Christmas hampers – which can also make wonderful Christmas gifts. Cakes, biscuits, truffles or other baked goods can all make wonderful gifts for the festive season, and these can also be made using a wide range of polytunnel grown fruits or vegetables.
DIY Christmas Drinks Using Polytunnel Produce
Another way to turn the fruits and vegetables that you grow in your polytunnel into exciting Christmas gifts is to make drinks for Christmas that you can give away to family and friends. You could consider making alcoholic drinks such as cider or wine, or infusing stronger alcohols with fruits or berries.
DIY Christmas Cleaning & Beauty Products
Many polytunnel grown herbs and flowers can also be used to make a wide range of Christmas gifts. For example, you could consider making your own soaps, shampoos, hair rinses, cleansers, moisturising lotions or bath bombs using the aromatic plants that you have grown.
DIY Christmas Seed Packs
You could also consider using Christmas as an excuse to introduce others to the joys of home growing. A nicely packaged seed pack could make a lovely Christmas gift, to help your friends or family to get started with growing and eating their own food year round. Gifting some of your own seeds, collected from your polytunnel could be a great and sustainable way to show your loved ones how much you care.
The above ideas are just some of the many things that polytunnel gardeners could consider gifting as DIY Christmas present ideas this year. Other ideas could include using pruned wood or berries to create unique, natural Christmas decorations, gift boxes, dyed natural fabrics or home décor… there are almost limitless ideas for home-made Christmas gifts for those who harness the power of nature to grow things in their gardens.
Do you grow your own? What DIY Christmas presents are you giving this year? Let us know in the comments below.
Elizabeth Waddington is a writer and green living consultant living in Scotland. Permaculture and sustainability are at the heart of everything she does, from designing gardens and farms around the world, to inspiring and facilitating positive change for small companies and individuals.
She also works on her own property, where she grows fruit and vegetables, keeps chickens and is working on the eco-renovation of an old stone barn.