| Decorating with Nutcrackers | By Lilly Petronka |
| Every year I use a "new" decorating theme for the Christmas season. This year I decorated with nutcrackers. I started collecting them a few years ago. I have nutcracker Christmas tree ornaments, twelve inch nutcrackers on my shelf in the kitchen and two and a half foot nutcrackers around my tree. |
| Nutcracker Theme for Christmas | By Lilly P. |
| Nutcrackers are everywhere. I used the nutcracker theme for decorating this year for Christmas. Nutcracker ornaments on the tree. Since nutcrackers come in all shapes and sizes I used four of the 2 1/2 ft. nutcrackers behind my tree, four 18" nutcrackers in my kitchen on the long shelf, and nutcrackers throughout my livingroom. Every year I use a "different" theme to make it different and more exciting! |
| Tabletop Centerpiece | By Kim McHughes |
| Instead of a traditional floral centerpiece, fill a large serving bowl with glass ball ornaments that coordinate with your dinnerware. |
| Walnut Ornaments | By Audrey Larson |
My late mother (born 1903) made walnut ornaments since childhood. She carefully opened walnuts into two perfect halves, removed the nuts, and glued the two halves together, inserting a red or green string-type hanger.
She then lightly shellacked or gilded the walnuts, and they last forever! They look lovely on the Christmas tree. |
| Christmas Balls | By Alda Tuk |
| Our Christmas balls have all our names on them. Our family makes it an evening decorating the tree and we carefully place our personalized balls on the tree. |
| Elegant & Festive Card Display | By Elizabeth Conroy |
| To elegantly display all your Holiday/Christmas cards, attach a pretty ribbon (I use velvet) to a door or wall. Use a hole puncher to punch a small hole in the card and the ribbon and then use another pretty ribbon to tie your cards to the ribbon hanging on your door/wall. Walla: A festive decoration, and a neat & organized way to display all your Holiday/Christmas Cards. |
| Think Outside the Tree | By Debbie Casse |
| Hang ornaments from your chandeliers for an easy and festive touch to holiday dinners and overall decorations. |
| Spiced nuts | By Julie Vlcek |
| A great holiday hostess gift is homemade spiced nuts. Choose your favorite spices and toss raw nuts and seeds in a bowl with them. Roast them until toasted. Put them in a short mason jar and tie it up with a ribbon for your host. |
| Expanding Foam Wreaths | By Melisa Brubaker |
You'll need a spray can of foam spray. The kind you use to fill cracks in your home, to keep out the weather.. a small round piece of cardboard..(I used the one that came with our Pizza)and old or new colored Christmas bulbs. Cover the cardboard with foil, spray the foam onto the cardboard, in a wreath shape, then stick the colored bulbs into the foam..When it dries..walla you have a white Christmas wreath with cute colored bulbs! You can also make Snowmen, Snow balls with a candle stuck in the center..many things, with little cost!
Merry Christmas
Melisa Brubaker
Bradford Ohio |
| Simple and Cheap | By Jennifer Larson |
| I don't like to use the same wrapping paper I did last year (I like to keep the illusion of Santa bringing seperate paper!) I found a way to use my old paper, and decorate inexpensively at the same time. I wrap all the frames on my wall! You don't have to wrap all the way around, just what people see, and leave room to rehang. You can just stick on a bow, or really dress it up. It looks like you have presents hanging from your wall! |
| Christmas Through the Years | By Kelly Staats |
| We send Christmas cards out every year with a picture of our children inserted on the front of the card. Each year we save our picture and put it in a Christmas picture frame. It has become a ritual each year for our two girls to pick the new "Christmas picture frame" that will hold this year's picture. As part of our holiday decorating, we put out in various places in our home, all our pictures saved in frames from our cards sent to family and friends. We are presently up to ten different frames and pictures. My children find it funny to look back at how they have changed from babies to the present. |
| Picture Frame Gifts | By Charlotte Foster |
| Take green and gold aluminium foil wrap and wrap picture frames in house. apply ribbon and red velvet bows. Gives festive air to halls and living room. Appears to be wrapped gifts. |
| Mini Christmas Trees | By Ruth |
| I work with young disabled people. this year we are collecting branches from the garden, spraying them gold or silver and planting them into a pot of plaster of paris. We will then decorate them with mini crackers etc to make them look like miniature trees. |
| Moon Lights | By Claudia Craig |
| I have a large custom made dining room light with eight lights in their own cubical and I hung all different moon decorations all around the entire light, and it it so wimsical and cute. The moon decorations can be hung from any Chandalier or lights in your house. The Grandchildren will love them. I actually leave mine up all year, they are too cute to take down. |
| Christmas Card Display | By Dave |
| One of my family's traditions is to display the various Christmas cards we receive. To do this we simply staple the cards to a long piece of wide ribbon, then using a thumbtack hang the ribbon on the wall. It is a nice touch and when visitors come they are thrilled to see the card they sent prominently displayed |
