Decorating on a shoestring this Christmas can be easy with some color, texture, and sparkle. Instead of heading out to the Christmas tree lot and then over to the expensive ornament stores in the mall, try giving your Christmas a creative twist. You'll like it so much that it will become a holiday tradition.
Creative Holiday Crafts
Your local craft store has an enormous variety of products that will make beautiful and inexpensive decorations. You get great value for your dollar if you invest in ribbon, some shiny baubles, and glue. Don’t be intimidated by all the merchandise, take a few minutes to look around. You’ll be hooked.
Beads, Baubles, and Ribbon Decorations
If you have a tree, consider decorating it with ribbon instead of ornaments, or grab an assortment of do-it-yourself ornaments that you can fill, paint, or embellish in an afternoon. Ribbon sold by the roll is inexpensive and available in many colors and variations on the Christmas themes of green and red or overall sparkle. Involve your children in the decorating process, and purchase elements like large beads and bells that they can string on ribbon or pipe cleaners.
Felt Decorations
Cut Christmas shapes like stockings, trees, and stars out of colored felt. String a ribbon through a hole punched in the top, and have your children decorate the cutouts with glitter.
Popcorn and Cranberry Decorations
Rely on the old standby of stringing popcorn and whole cranberries on dental floss and using these colorful garlands on your tree, or draped on your mantle or staircase.
Cookie Cutouts
Make your own ornaments using inexpensive cookie cutters and dough made with salt, flour, and water. Bake the hanging-string right into the ornament and decorate with paints and brushes that you can get at your craft store for pennies. The great thing is that you can use these ornaments from year to year.
Easy Gingerbread House
Make an easy gingerbread house using the many kits or cheats available. It doesn't have to be expensive, and it's a great way to work on a project with your children. After the holiday, wrap your gingerbread creation carefully and placing it in a cool dry place. With some care and a little luck, you can use it as a decoration for a number of years -- if no one eats it first. If you try making your own from scratch, use household food items like pretzels and cereal as decoration. It will get your creative juices flowing and create a memory your family will never forget.
Decorate Your Kitchen for Christmas
The kitchen is the heart of your home, so give it a touch of the Christmas spirit by putting your Christmas cards on the refrigerator door with magnets, or adding an advent calendar. If you are doing the Christmas cooking this year, buy an inexpensive blackboard and tabletop frame rest and write your Christmas menu in colored chalk. Add candy canes to your cabinet handles, and drape a festive Christmas towel from one of your cabinet doors.
Indoor Christmas Wreaths
You can make or purchase Christmas wreaths of either real or artificial evergreen material pretty inexpensively. Use door or suction hooks to mount wreaths on the interior doors of your home. Let your child decorate a wreath for his bedroom door using his favorite small toys as decorations, fastening them to the wreath with ribbon.
Many Christmas tree lots will let you have discarded evergreen material from which you can make your own wreaths and swags with craft wire. If you are using an artificial tree, or are not decorating with a tree at all, consider making or buying a natural evergreen wreath to bring the fragrance of pine indoors for the holiday.
Use your imagination instead of your pocketbook to decorate your home for the holidays. In the years to come, it will be the unique decorations that bring back the sweetest memories.
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