Christmas Decorating tips to help you find the easiest way to decorate your home for Christmas. Make your home look Christmassy with these simple decor ideas and inspiration – and NO overwhelm!.
But it can often feel overwhelming when you have the house to decorate – inside AND out. It’s another Christmas related pressure that, let’s face it, we could do without!
So – how can we make our homes look Christmassy without spending hours, or a fortune(!), in the process?
These Christmas decorating tips will help.
They go through everything from planning, to individual items like the tree and the dinner table – and give you the chance to decorate to your own budget and taste – so let’s get started, and make your home look fantastic this festive season.
16 Amazing Christmas Decorating Tips To Try This Year
1 – Know What Decorations You Have, And Plan It All Out
It’s always a good idea to make a list of everything you have – or take pictures.
Then, at the end of each Christmas when you take everything down, you can mark off anything that has broken or needs replacing ready for next year – while it’s fresh in your head.
This means that you can also take advantage of the January sales for buying anything that’s needed.
It pays to get ahead with decorations, so if you haven’t already got a list, then start one this year – you won’t regret it!
Then, if you know WHAT you have, the next step is to plan WHERE it will go (and therefore if it’s all needed after all).
Before you even start to get the step ladder out – it’s worth thinking carefully about where things will go.
See what rooms you want to decorate (usually these will be the social rooms and possibly a few decorations in the kids bedrooms too), and then how much decor you want in each space.
If you have a few decorations – what will give you the most ‘bang for your buck’?
2 – Less Is More!
Remember that you don’t have to go overboard with decorations to make an amazing impact at this time of year.
Think about the rooms that you will be socialising in in your home, and focus on these first. Then look at having 1-2 key items in the room that will make a real statement instead of lots of little things that will just end up cluttering the space.
If you have the tree in one room – that’s probably enough! – otherwise you will be drawing the eyes away from this…
Maybe have a garland around the fireplace or up the stair bannisters – or display all your Christmas cards on one wall – whatever you choose, these will look great and make the room just festive enough!
3 – You Don’t Need To Blow The Budget
Ideally you will have a list of what decorations you already have, and know what broke or needs replacing by the end of the last year.
You should always do this straight after so that you are only packing away what you buy decorations AFTER Christmas to take advantage of the January sales – but if you haven’t done that then don’t blow the budget on what you want.
You can either spend less, or buy less – but stick to whatever you can afford and make it go as far as possible…
4 – Choose A Colour Scheme / Theme, And Stick To It
Having some sort of theme within your decorations will look amazing, tie each room together, and enable you to use decorations in different rooms over the years for a change.
I like to stick to 2-3 colours – and then I know when I see new decorations what will and won’t make a nice addition to the collection.
TIP – Keeping things neutral with silvers and golds will work with any room colour scheme. These colours are timeless as well, so you are less likely to grow tired of them over the years and have to purchase a new set.
5 – Remember Scale When Choosing The Tree
Don’t buy a Christmas tree that’s too large for your home – measure the space before you go shopping! – that’s width as well as height…
Trees always look much smaller when they are outside or in big stores – but can all too easily take over your home if you get it wrong (it’s very much like when you go sofa shopping – then find that it won’t fit into your home even though it looked pretty small in the shop…)
6 – Can You Make Instead Of Buy?
Have a bit of a DIY Christmas when it comes to decor, and you may just be surprised and delighted at the results (not to mention the cost!).
You can gather Pine cones and spray with some fake snow – a pine cone or three make a fantastic arrangement that looks great in lots of places in your home over the festive period.
Or, what about using discs of pine trees as your coasters, for a natural and rustic Christmas touch?
7 – Go Fake Vs. Real
Work out whether you really need/want a real Christmas tree this holiday season, or whether fake (an artificial Christmas tree) could work just as well for you.
Fake Christmas trees look great nowadays and can save a lot of money over the years (before you buy ensure you have somewhere to store it first!).
8 – Buy One Thing A Year Rather Than All At Once
I love the tradition of adding a little each year to the decorations. It definitely adds some Christmas cheer!
Of course, there are things that break and need replacing – but I’m talking about something like getting a new bauble for the tree each year (great for the kids to choose a special one as these create memories), or a larger item like a gorgeous Christmas wreath (helpful for spreading the cost over the years).
We did this when we were collecting out decorations supplies – in the first ten/fifteen years we lived together.
One year we got a gorgeous tree that hangs on the wall, and another we got some fake foliage that’s pre-lit and surrounds the fireplace or gets trailed up the stair bannisters.
This way, we can afford to get something we really want, and not feel like it breaks the bank.
9 – Clean The House Before You Put The Decorations Up
I know, I know – the very last thing you are probably wanting to do before you start decorating for Christmas is to do a thorough clean, but trust me, it’s worth it.
Think about it. The decorations for most people are up for around a month – and they can take over a lot of surfaces when they are up.
This makes it almost impossible to clean these surfaces for 1/12 of the year….
If you clean thoroughly beforehand, then things won’t look as bad when it comes to the day you take them all down.
You don’t want to be forced into cleaning straight away after Christmas, I’m sure!
10 – Use Plants For A Fresh Touch
Using fresh plants at this time of year is a lovely way to decorate easily and add some gorgeous greenery to the house. You could use traditional plants like Poinsettias, or Eucalyptus – or (of course) a fresh pine tree.
11 – Check Lights Work Before Putting Them Up
Check tree lights are working before you put them on the tree – they are much easier to fix at this stage, and I for one only want to put the fairy lights / string lights on the tree once each year!
Honestly – they are much easier to sort out when not put up anywhere already in the house – whether it be a Christmas tree, or wrapped around the bannister or mantlepiece etc..
12 – Get The Kids To Help Decorate
I love to let my daughter help with decorating the tree, and she has her own nativity scene that she sets up each year as well (making fake hay and everything lol!).
Getting the kids to help is a fantastic tradition, however much you want them involved…. (I refer to the classic FRIENDS episode where Monica lets everyone decorate the tree, and then turns it around to reveal the side that she has decorated perfectly! – if this sounds like you, then why not get a tree for the kids to do and a ‘grown up’ tree for you!).
13 – Spend A Day Decorating And Make It A Tradition
I LOVE doing this with my family each year.
We tend to shop for a tree in the morning, grabbing anything we need along the way for decorating – and then turn the Christmas music on full blast and get decorating.
Adding in a Christmas card or two to the Christmas decorations also makes things different and more personal each year, as these constantly change, of course.
Brilliant memories!
14 – Use Things In Different Ways To The Norm
What about putting lots of baubles in a glass jar for a centre decoration on a table, or on a mantelpiece?
It’s a great idea if they don’t have their hooks/strings as well!
15 – Don’t Forget The Outside As Well
When decorating, don’t forget about outside the house – adding lights makes all the difference at this time of year.
We started using battery operated lights on our trees last year and I totally love them. I especially love that you can set them on a timer so they come on and turn off automatically. It made a lovely feature at the front of the house.
AND
What about a Christmassy welcome mat?
16 – Swap Out Christmas Themed Items For Normally Used Ones
We all have decor in our homes throughout the year, and adding in EXTRA decor at Christmas can feel cluttered and too busy.
As such – one of my favourite Christmas decorating ideas is to make some simple changes, and swap out a few things instead of adding to them? This means you get a change of look, and have less to clean instead of more!
Things you could swap out include:
- Cushions
- Artwork
- Candles – a Christmas candle, with specific smells of Christmas, can be a gorgeous and simple way to add some Christmas cheer or Christmas spirit to your home.
- Signs
- Welcome Mat
- Table runner
Article by organisemyhouse.com