Simple Ways to Decorate for Christmas
As many of you know, a couple of years ago we packed up our family of six and moved into an apartment. It was interesting figuring out how to put a 2400 square foot home into a 1200 square foot apartment, that’s for sure. One of the more challenging parts of this epic squeeze was decorating for Christmas — I couldn’t possibly use all the goodies in my three giant Christmas tubs. Many of my Christmas decorations were too big for our smaller space.
In addition to the space constraints, there was also the problem of my, well, lack of decorating ambition. I loved the idea of crafting up some new decorations, but actually getting my crafty on was another story. Instead of intending to be crafty and fill my apartment with homemade Christmas goodness but failing miserably, I opted to take the simple route. No glue gun, no floral wire, no fabric needed.
Here are three simple ways to decorate a small space for Christmas:
Use canning jars to decorate
Emily talked about this, and I am constantly amazed at all the ways you can decorate with a simple mason jar.
This one was easy peezy. I saw boxes of small colored bulb ornaments at Fred Meyer (near the mini-tree items) and thought they would be perfect displayed in a canning jar.
I love that there were glossy and matte bulbs in the same box to give the display extra interest. There were several colors to choose from.
I also picked up some cranberries in a bag in the Fred Meyer produce department and some 50% off candles in the home department.
I love how some fruit, a candle and a jar come together to make a beautiful table decoration.
I also poured some Epsom salt into smaller canning jars and put a candle on top — Epsom salt looks just like snow and it’s crazy cheap (you might just have some in your bathroom cabinet). In fact, you should search Pinterest to find all the wintery crafts that you can do with Epsom salt (I also just found this sweet craft).
Use stocking holders to hang stockings anywhere
I was fretting a bit trying to figure out how to hang our stockings without a fireplace mantle or without nailing seven holes in the wall (I’m not against messing with the walls, but I’d rather not pay part of our damage deposit on holes that served a purpose for only three weeks). The Halleluiah Chorus starting up when I found these simple stocking hangers.
They aren’t exactly the cheapest option available, but at 50% off, they were an investment I was willing to make (and probably cheaper than the damage deposit hit) and I didn’t have to put any creative energy into it (that all has been sapped by endless laundry and face washing). I hung the stockings from the breakfast bar, but these would also work on a window ledge. These will work for hanging stockings or other decorations at any place we live in the future.
Use tomato cages to make an outdoor tree
I’m sure most of you even casual gardeners have a few tomato cages sitting in your garage or garden shed. Pull them out and make a quick and inexpensive lighted Christmas tree. This is the perfect outdoor decoration for those of you with small personal outdoor spaces or if you can’t staple lights to the outside trim. These would also be a great addition to your front porch decorations.
I used tomato cages and some inexpensive white lights from Fred Meyer (I used white, but I think green would look nice and could be displayed past Christmas).
Start by flipping the cage over and pulling the unattached poles together to make a tree shape. I bound them together with the twist tie from my package of Christmas lights. I used my daughter’s ponytail holder for the other cage.
Start winding a strand of lights around the outside of the cage.
I didn’t attach the lights in any way — just wind it somewhat tight and they will stay.
When you get to the bottom, attach the string of lights to the cage so it doesn’t unravel on you. I used a bread bag tie-thingy.
If you’re moving to another cage to make multiple trees, just feed the strand through the middle of the cage and start wrapping again.
The best part of this decoration is that the mechanics of the tree lights will be unseen at night so you don’t have to fuss too much with the tree’s construction. I couldn’t manage to take a picture that does the final product justice. I wish I could invite you all over to see how cool the trees look, especially from the street.
Need some more holiday inspiration? Check out these two posts:
Or more simple decorating ideas?
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I like the lights my husband puts up in the house and the stockings.
Trimming the tree with my son and wife.
This year I wrapped the upside down tomato cages with garland and white lights, then put them on top of large decorative pots. They looked like the expensive topiary-type trees you would buy at the store!
Bringing nature inside! Brought home pine cones from central Oregon, gleaned tree trimmings from a tree lot, stringing popcorn and more!
I loves me some nutcrackers and snowmen! I would have them all over the house if my husband would let me. 🙂
Stockings everywhere.
Themed trees are my favorite. This year it’s a snowman/snowflake tree. Other years it’s a “fancy” tree, a rustic tree, a “fun” tree…
I love LED lights on my deck.
I love our nativity scene and candles around the house. I also love using real fruit, and plants. This year we found a great deal on vintage bubble lights. We’re trying to recreate christmas at my husbands grandmas house, which he loved so much.
I love to let my kids do the decorating. We like to do crafts every year to add. We blast Christmas tunes and there is always lots of laughing.
We decorate with items that both my husband and I grew up with. For me, it is a ceramic trio of angels, very vintage and 60`s. They line across the back of my piano seated up on angels hair. With 2 new little little girls in our family this Christmas, we are thankful for Gods unending faithfullness and love for us!
Mini lights and white, sparkly garland dress up boring apartment windows. 🙂
The simpler the better in my home with 3 kids and a new kitty! Just a tree, stockings and a few carefully placed snowmen. Lights outside of course.
I LOVE lights! On the tree, along the banister, outside on the house….wherever you can string them. The warm glow reminds me that even though it’s cold outside, we are richly blessed!
I like putting lights around the windows
We love hanging Christmas cards on a rope and tassel draped from the fireplace mantel, or putting them up on the kitchen cabinets back so we can see them in the dining room. I also drape a lighted garland over the living room entry arch, and hang the breakable bulbs from each loop. Kiddo + cats = no glass ornaments on the tree. 🙂
Anything my young artist son brings home from school goes up!
Our favorite thing to put out at Christmas is our Little People Nativity scene, both my girls love to play with it and talk about baby Jesus.
This year I used my large plant pots and made such a cute cheap DIY project. I left the soil in the pots from my summer plants, and added garland to the top along with Christmas bulbs and lots of sparkly things 🙂 They turned out so cute and everyone that has come over has commented on them! At only about $2.50 a piece you can’t beat that.
Lots of candles! I love Fred Meyer!
I love decorating with lights! they’re my favorite
What great ideas! Thanks for sharing. My favorite is definitely candles. Lots and lots.
My favorite way we have decorated was by making homemade reigndeer out of firewood. They were so cute! It took us awhile to make two, so we only made them one year. I would love to try it again maybe.
I love doing everything!
I love filling jars with red and white candies. The mantle is full of all kinds of candy. Pretty to look at and good to eat!
Strings of white lights on anything that will hold still! 🙂
We got a fake tree at Lowes years ago the day after christmas. It was 24 dollars and 12 feet tall. Every year we switch it up and take out sections of the tree to make it shorter, more narrow, fatter, etc. We decorate it with things that my child has made. Best 24 bucks I ever spent on decorations.
I like to start by making christmas cookies and then put out special plates and stuffed animals…and listen to my wireless peanuts band and singing clock!
We live in apartments but we decorate our entire balcony. We have a Santa and some snowmen on a sled. We usually have the most lit up apartment in our complex.
My mother’s idea is very nice. She uses wrapping paper and bowes to wrap the pictures on the wall. It looks like presents on the wall. You can also use old pictures you don’t like anymore, then you dont have to rewrap them every year (or take the wrapping off nicely and use it next year for another gift).
We also have grapes vines at our new house. This year I tried wrapping them into a wreath. It was my first try. Next year i will have to cut them earlier when they are still flexable. Then i can add holly, bows, ornaments..etc. Homemade wreaths.
I love to decorate with lots of lights and candles.
We keep it pretty simple. Stockings hung above the fireplace, a Christmas tree, & a few strings of lights.
My favorite decoration is a Santa and Mrs. Santa cream and sugar containers I got from my mother. We had them when I was growing up and I use them now for my kids. We also make a paper chain to loop on doorways every year.
This year a girlfriend and me did some crafting together for Christmas. We spray painted wine bottles white, used adhesive to sprinkle Epsom salt all over the bottles and then got some discounted plastic red and white leaves branches from the craft store to put in the bottles. They make a great center piece, or entry way decoration.
My favorite decorations for the holidays are all my Byer caroler dolls with their snowy trees and street lamps. I have them spread throughout my home.
I love using lots of Christmas lights to decorate!
We love putting up our tree, displaying our Nutcracker collection, and setting up our village.. We love Christmas!
Lights, lights and more LIGHTS! They are so simple but i love to have them glowing when all the other lights are off. It warms my heart!
I have really pared down my decorating, especially since my children are both grown and there are not grandbabies yet. I decorated the chandelier over the dining table with greenery and hung some ornaments from each arm of the chandelier. A wreath on the door and that is about it. Although I have been considering doing Epson salt frost on my front windows.
I love using greens and holly on the mantle with candles.
I buy a live Norfolk potted Christmas tree. I reuse the tree and declare it for Valentines day and St Patrick’s day. I love decorating with many strands of Christmas tree. I also enjoy decorating my tables with Christmas decorations.
We’ve gotten several boxes of lights from Fred Meyer for only $1.75 with recent sales, so we’ve put them everywhere. My favorite are the blue ones in the kids’ rooms as a festive night light.
A nativity set and stockings on the mantle.
Love your cranberries + candle idea.
My favorite way to decorate is with our semi-homemade mini-stocking advent calendar. Each stocking has a sweet and an activity inside.
Vintage ornaments in jars. They’re safe in there!
I love to decorate all over but my favorite is my Christmas village on our mantle!!! Also lights, lights & more lights! 🙂
I love making salt dough ornaments with my girls, we keeps some each year and they give some away. Now we have some special keep sakes every year, that also lets us see them grow up with how they are able to be more detailed and it will be something for them to have when they are older.
My favorite way to decorate for Christmas is to string mini Christmas lights along the perimeter of our living room & dining room. Our two boys (5 and 3) also have lights in their bedroom. Our apartment is pretty small (900 sq ft!), so the soft glow of the mini-lights and the wonderful scent of our live tree easily fills it up with Christmas spirit!
I love all things with glitter when decorating for the holidays 😉
Since we are expecting baby boy #3 anytime, we are keeping things simple this year. Just a tree, wreath, lights, poinsettias (from Black Friday of course) and a nativity. We are just enjoying Jesus birthday month and each other.