Decorating your home the old-fashioned way Christmas decorations is a great way to spend time with your family and can cut the cost of buying all those costly decorations.
Decorating your home for Christmas can be fun, but expensive. You can cut the cost of decorating by adding fun, color, and scents of the holiday season by old-fashioned, natural decorations that your family, friends, and guests will love.
Depending on where you live, some of these suggestions may not be feasible. For instance, if you live in a state where Douglas fir trees or pine trees of any type are not readily available, you may not have the items at hand, although, you can get creative and design your own by making alterations from the original.
In the kitchen area, color and aromas of the holidays begin. If you bake for the holidays, this alone will add to the Christmas spirit by adding a scent of cookies, gingerbread, bread, or cakes. Guests and family will love coming to your home!
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Add color to your kitchen décor by placing some apples and limes, avocados and pomegranates in a nice decorative bowl. This can be placed in your kitchen, living room, or dining room, where guests and family can enjoy the “fruits of your labor“, plus add color. Try to choose fruits and veggies that are red and green in hue to blend in well with the spirit of the holidays.
Oranges can be hung or placed in baskets with cinnamon cloves stuck into them. It adds an orange cinnamon smell that can remind everyone of days gone by. Place apples or apple cider in a pan; add a couple of sticks of cinnamon and maybe a sprinkle of nutmeg to simmer on your stove. This potpourri of ingredients will create the perfect atmosphere for holiday tree trimming or entertaining.
Be creative with remnants of tree trimming or pine tree sprigs that have been cut from outside your home, or you can pick some up from your local tree stand. They will trim trees for customers and will have some on hand.
Visit a forest and clip small pieces of tree branches to add the scent of pine or fir trees. Place around candles on a table or fireplace. Tie the trimmings around a wire ring to create a beautiful wreath. If you have access to holly bushes, add sprigs of holly to give some color. Cranberries can be glued to the wreath to add coloring also.
If you live someplace where you don’t have access to a lot of tree branches, florists will often carry various sprigs of scented plants or additions, such as eucalyptus stalks. Eucalyptus adds an unbeatable aroma and can add that old-fashioned Christmas look to any room. Once again, add cranberries or red beads to give that decorative flair. Ribbons in gold, green, red, or silver often times make a decoration stand out and get noticed.
Fir, pine, holly, and spruce sprigs placed around an outside window create an old-fashioned ambiance. Add lights or ribbons, berries or ornaments and you have a great decorative creation.
Add the sprigs of trees to your hearth, table, or bookshelf. Place a couple of candles, decorations such as snowmen, or ribbons and the room comes alive with color and scent.
Threading cranberries on a string to place around the tree or table, or to blend into your sprigs of pine or fir on your hearth is a great way to add color. Cranberries and popcorn can be strung together to bring out the traditional garland strands on trees.
Baking up some gingerbread men, decorated with white frosting not only makes the house smell good, but they can be sprayed with shellac and strung with thread to make tree decorations too. Gingerbread is a pretty sturdy dough and when baked is hard enough to last through the season. Adding the shellac hardens the cookies, creating a wonderful tree decoration.
If you crochet, there are snowflake designs to add color and traditional decorative ornaments. Snowflakes are fairly simple to make and since they are hardened by cornstarch, can be hung from ceilings, door frames and various other high areas to create a winter wonderland. Snowflakes can be made from the white threads, as is usually called for, or crocheted from the silver and gold threads now available.
Knitting or crocheting Christmas tree skirts are a wonderful way to add color and an old-fashioned look to the room. Patterns for small tree decorations such as stockings, sleds, Santa’s and more can be found in craft stores. Even taking silver, green, gold, or red wrapped peanut butter cup miniatures and adding eyes, nose, and antlers from pipe cleaners will create little reindeer ornaments and will keep the smaller children busy for hours.
Some of the best Christmas memories are made from the care and love you put into decorating your home with decorations you’ve made yourself. The store bought items are great, however, you put them up, and take them back down at the end of the season.
Creating your own decorations is a wonderful family project and since you are bringing your own ideas to fruition, you are creating memories that will last a lifetime. For more ideas and tips on decorating the old-fashioned way, visit here.
Merry Christmas to all, and happy decorating!
