DIY Christmas Decor
- Siobhan Lam
- Nov 30, 2014
- 4 min read
With Christmas around the corner and those governmental types doing everything in their power to tax the bejesus out of us, it's easy to get a little overwhelmed by the costly nature of this festive season. So here at April and the Bear, we decided to put together some easy DIY tips on introducing festive cheer into your home/apartment without spending too much.
LIGHT-ME UP BRANCHES
This fun little arrangement is super easy and super quick! I hope you took heed when I suggested foraging for branches a few weeks back!
What you’ll need:
A fallen tree branch
A vase or similar to hold branch
1. Take your tree branch and ensure that it's clean and dry. Then start to wind the fairy lights around the branch. I would suggest starting with the end closest to the plug, wind this around the bottom stem and work your way up the branch.
2. Once you've covered the branch, switch on the fairylights and check to see if your happy with the placement of the lights. If parts of the branch have more lights than the rest, re-arrange them until your happy.
3. Pop the branch in a vase near a plug socket or extension lead and BOOM, you've just created a beautifully lit festive display. It's simple but stunning and adds a dollop of Christmas cheer to a room especially if you haven't got room for a Christmas tree this year.
Next up we have some proper DIY work, it'll take a little dexterity and time but is so worth it in the end. Stick with me folks!
WHITE STAR GARLAND - WITH OPTIONAL CHALK TREE
What you’ll need:
A couple of sheets of white A4 paper
A pair of scissors
Needle and white thread
Pen/pencil
Ruler
Right! This is proper ART ATTACK stuff so embrace your younger self and grab those scissors.
1. First thing to do is draw a simple star - you'll find a template online or print the below image out and work from there. Try and draw the star near to one of the corners of the a4 sheet and we're aiming for a star about 2 - 3 inches in size.
2. Once your star is drawn, fold the paper down the centre and then fold again in the other direction - you should be able to fold it three times in this direction. Keep your star to the top of the fold.
3. Then using the scissors, cut around the star template and this will give you six rather darling paper stars.
4. Using one of the paper stars you have just cut, draw around to create another star on a new piece of paper and repeat the whole process again. You will need to repeat this process about 5 times depending on how long you want your garland to be. This is, to be fair, is quite the monotonous task, so feel free to throw on a suitably festive TV show while you work - I would highly recommend the Gilmore Girls.
5. Once you have all your stars cut, you can move on to sowing. You might want to turn off the television now ... or not, it's your life babycakes. Take a long length of white thread and double loop through a needle, you can mark on the star where the thread should go but this does take longer so decide as you go. Each star should take roughly 4 -6 stitches.
6. Leave roughly 2 inches of thread between each star and continue until you have a fabulous garland! Don't worry if you run out of thread before you run out of stars, you can very easily sow and link smaller garlands to create one long garland.
And hey presto! You my friend have just created a white star garland for (practically) free. NICELY DONE. I knew you could, and you did. Now this garland can be draped across your mantel, popped on the tree or wound around the stair banister but what I'm going to do is go a step further and drape it across a chalked Christmas tree.
SPOILER ALERT - You'll need a chalkboard wall for this part.
7. Draw a Christmas tree on your chalkboard, I went for a fairly simplistic shape as my tree-drawing skills leave a lot to be desired but go for a more detailed tree if you're lucky enough to have those mad skills.
8. Then cut small strips of cellotape and use these to stick the star garland to the new-created tree boughs.
And there you have it, a festive white star garland hanging from the boughs of a freshly-drawn chalk Christmas tree! Now sit back and enjoy your utterly unique Christmas tree and relish in the fact that you won't be hoovering up random tree needles in the new year!
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