Christmas is a magical time filled with friends, family, parties and presents. Making your own  Christmas decorations and ornaments is not only challenging, it’s also a nice way to get your kids or friends involved. You can go out for walks in the park together to collect materials like evergreens, empty bird’s nests, pine cones, nuts, dried flowers and so much more. Make sure you got plenty of different colors and textures to play with. Natural Christmas decoration is fun, eco-friendly and you’ll save a lot of money on your holiday budget. This is how we bring the outdoors inside for the holiday season.

Wreaths

When making your own wreath, don’t worry if it looks a bit weird in the beginning. The trick about making wreaths is not to care too much about where you’re going. Holes can be filled in later with bird’s nest or seed pods, it will end up full eventually. To make a wreath, wire evergreen branches together and decorate with magnolia leaves, pine cones, fir cones, sticks, branches, discarded bird’s nests, grasses, twigs, herbs, dried flowers, berries or ivy. You can use a glue gun to keep things in place, the possibilities are endless really. By the way, did you know that you can make your own wreath ring by bending a wire coat hanger into a circle with the hook as the hanger?

Dinner table centerpieces

For eye-catching centerpieces surround red or cream candles with ivy, pine cones and fresh foliage. Cranberries, nuts,  lady’s apples, dried flowers, and ribbons are excellent ways to add some color to your centerpiece. You can also simply fill a vase with nuts or berries if you want to keep things sober. Or why not spray pine cones with some white paint to resemble snow? Extra cozy!

Christmas tree

Whether you get a live or artificial Christmas tree, there are many options in terms of decoration. You could, for example, spray large walnuts, pine cones and seed pots with gold or silver paint to add some sparkle to your tree. Dried fruits are another winner. Very slowly dry sliced citrus fruits out in the oven on a low temperature. You will be surprised by the outcome as they will spread a lovely fragrance too. The same holds true for dried apples and cinnamon sticks. In any case don’t forget to glue a ribbon loop on top. Garlands are also fairly easy to make yourself. You just string popcorn or cranberry together and optionally combine this with a red ribbon to make things even more colorful. Finally, if you have cookie cutters, you can cut out all kind of shapes like angels, stars and hearts from salt dough and bake in a very low oven. Your kids will love this. You could actually do the same with gingerbread men, but they don’t keep very long… An extra tip is to buy a tree that’s somewhat too big, so you can then trim some of the branches and use them for other decorations around the house.

Mantel decorations

Personally I love to use moss for my mantel decorations. There’s just one thing, you need to grow it indoors in pots before using it to prevent it from being buried beneath a thick layer of snow in winter. Combine the moss with small apples, live greenery, a couple of candles and fresh white flowers. A basket filled with pine cones completes the picture.

Outside decorating

For outside, try to keep things simple. Gather evergreens from the garden, take some Christmas tree trimmings and wire them together. You can then drape around porches and fences. Just like with wreaths things like berries, apples, painted pine cones and ribbons are excellent ways to add a bit of color. Beside garlands you could decorate your garden with outside wreaths and candles in self-made lanterns. If you have any cranberry or popcorn garlands left from your Christmas tree, put them on outside trees. The birds will be thankful!

If you would like to read more on the subject, we suggest Christmas Decorations from Williamsburg

Enjoy the holiday season,
Denise