Calgarians are embracing the adage to eat local by returning to their roots, and planting both individual backyard gardens and community gardens with gusto. The next logical step, once you have all that fresh produce, is to spend some time in the kitchen preserving the fruits of your harvest for the winter ahead.

What’s the first thing you think of when I say “canning, pickling and drying”? According to author Sherri Brooks Vinton, the first two reactions are usually a fear of hard work and a fear of killing someone. In her new book, Put ‘em Up! A Comprehensive Home Preserving Guide for the Creative Cook from Drying and Freezing to Canning and Picking, Vinton writes:

“Why on earth would you do that?” That’s what people want to know when they see me moving through the hardware store balancing five cases of Mason jars on my way to the cash register. It’s often followed by “Aren’t you afraid you’ll kill someone?” I guess these questions pretty much sum up the most widely held beliefs about home food preservation: 1) that it’s hugely time-consuming and not worth the effort, and 2) that it’s mysterious, difficult, and wickedly dangerous. Well, I say, not true and not true. Home food preservation is simple and delicious, and no one was harmed in the marking of this book.”

Put ‘em up! Is an entertaining, colourful, and informative book with instructions on how to preserve everything from apples to zucchini, along with mouth-watering recipes. She does make preserving food sound easy. Beet Relish? No problem! Dilly Beans? I could make them in my sleep! If I could just get off the couch…

I’ve never been squeamish around worms. In fact, I remember hauling a poor wiggler out of my worm bin during a party and regaling my guests with stories about my new pet. I’ve developed a mild case of Scoleciphobia, however, after reading the section on vermicomposting in Composting for Canada by Suzanne Lewis. The description of how worms mate, if you can call it that, was particularly disturbing.

That said this is one of the best books I’ve read on vermicomposting with clear, detailed instructions on everything from setting up and maintaining a bin to troubleshooting tips and information on worm pests and friends. The author has a decade's experience in educating Edmontonians about composting and waste reduction, so the book should be worth its ... dirt.

When I vermicomposted my worms suffered a mould infestation. According to Lewis, mould is simply another decomposer, and is not harmful to your bin. She says mould grows when food is left on the surface of the bedding instead of being worked in. Maybe the mould didn’t kill them after all; maybe I just forgot to feed them. I’m going to re-read it very carefully before I decide to try vermicomposting again.

How to Sew A Button and other Nifty Things Your Grandmother Knew by Erin Bried might not seem like a 'green' book at first glance. It's a simple, no frills, no nonsense guide to the wisdom our grandmothers knew and used in daily life. That's the beauty of it, however. Old-fashioned wisdom was often the best solution for the environment, our pocketbook and our own health.

The chapters are divided up into cooking; gardening; cleaning; dressing; nesting; thriving; loving; saving; joining and entertainment. Learn how to 'repel furry friends' from your garden or start a compost; how to use vinegar or baking soda to clean almost anything; how to fix worn clothes or make art out of pressed flowers.

Don’t overlook the other sections though: the section on How to Write a Letter to your Representative is handy for any environmentalist and the section on How to Win an Utterly Silly Argument will come in handy when dealing with climate change deniers.

The wisdom and stories were collected from 10 grandmothers who lived through the Great Depression and short bios of each are included in the Introduction. Check it out!

Environmentalists have a bad reputation as overly earnest, dour, end-of-world types. But that’s slowly shifting as environmentalism, or giving a darn about the earth, becomes more mainstream.

Sometimes green folks and green books can be positively … funny. Yes, I said funny.

The best books are those that are funny and get you thinking. Then you don’t feel like you’re being hit over the head with a baseball hat. Don’t get me wrong –sometimes we do need to be hit over the head with a baseball bat, but not all the time. Sometimes we need a break.

If you need a break from heavy, serious eco-lit, let me give you two book suggestions.

The first: Bothered by My Green Conscience by Franke James is not only fun and thought-provoking, but illustrated with funky pictures by the author, a Toronto artist. James decided to sell her SUV and rip up her driveway to plant a garden, and endures the reactions from family and friends, and even Toronto City Hall to her wild, green scheme. Along the way she discusses how social change happens: awareness versus action, empathy versus self-interest, and fines vs. social disapproval. The result is a whimsical look at one person’s efforts to do the hardest thing first to counter climate change in her personal life.

The second: Greasy Rider: Two Dudes, One Fry-Oil-Powered Car, and Cross-Country Search for a Greener Future by Greg Melville is an eco-road story. Melville and his old college chum, Iggy, depart on a cross country tour visiting green hot-spots like Google’s headquarters, Al Gore’s mansion, Fort Knox, a wind farm, a renewable energy lab, and a green home, driving an old Mercedes converted to run on vegetable oil. While I wouldn’t say this book was hilarious, like some reviewers did, it was entertaining and very readable. And not to worry; it doesn’t skirt ethanol’s thorny issues.

Joel Waldfogel is my kind of economist. His new book Scroogenomics asks us to analyze our gift-giving, especially at this time of year, and ask ourselves if it's really worth it. Waldfogel says that our consumer spending creates huge amounts of economic waste because so very often the gifts we get, aren’t the gifts we want. Think of the book from Aunt Millie you’d never read in a million years, or the sweater your brother picked out which would look better on…him.

Waldfogel is approaching the problem of gift-giving from a purely economic point-of-view and economics is renowned for leaving the Earth out of the picture. The tons and tons of waste holiday gift-giving generates through not only unwanted gifts, but also the packaging, the transportation and the disposal of said gifts is a sign of a consumer culture gone wild.

I’ve always tried to buy things I think my family and friends would like, but sometimes it feels more like a shot in the dark. Does John already have a Leatherman? Would my Aunt like this toque?

Then, when I get frustrated and panicked in the mall, I sometimes reach for something I’d like, and hope they’d like it too. This year I nearly bought my brother and sister each a neti pot, along with the salts and how-to book for cleansing your nasal passages before my sense kicked in and I thought “Maybe they wouldn’t really want a neti pot as a Christmas gift.”

I think next year I’ll remind myself of Scroogenomics and give consumables like home-made granola (insert hippie joke now) or simple gifts like beaded bookmarks instead of haunting the malls with a feverish look on my face—like the Ghost of Christmas Past.