Holiday DIY Ideas for Charming Christmas Decor

Okay, as a designer, I love holiday decor that looks elevated, but I also love a good DIY that anyone can make. Today, I'm gonna show you four projects that check both boxes. So, give me 10 minutes and I'll show you how to turn these simplest materials into classic, charming Christmas decor that you can decorate your home with or give as gifts. Okay, we're gonna start out with one of my all-time favorites, a dried clementine tabletop tree. You are going to be obsessed with this one. So, the first thing that we're gonna do is find some type of a little tree form. This is like a floral cone, you know, that you could put floral in. You could use a party hat or you could even make a cone out of like a poster board or something like that. You just need some type of a form to put your little clementine slices around. Now, next up, we need to think about our clementine. So, I grabbed a big bag at Costco and I sliced them at about an eighth of an inch thick, dried them off. You need to make sure they're really good and dry. Put them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and then put them in the oven. Set it at about 175 degrees and depending on how thick your slices are, you will want to cook them for anywhere between four to six hours. Okay, so I did grab a paper plate and put it down underneath my little tree because I get crazy with the glue gun and I'm just gonna say I think that this glue gun is from 1999 and it has given me lots of great years of crafting. Okay, so I went ahead and started with a single ring around the bottom of my little form and then I'm just gonna keep adding. So, just put a couple of dots of hot glue on your slices and then just build it up. We're just gonna build it all the way up. You kinda have to hold it a little bit and I did leave the plastic on the foam form because I felt like, well, if the hot glue gets on, it'll pull off pretty easily. So, we're just gonna keep doing that and layering it all the way around. You'll notice as I add one on, you're just gonna put, layer it on top of the slice that it's next to. That way, it's gonna be attached to the bottom pieces and then also to the one next to it. Okay, it's done. Look how cute it is. Okay, now we're gonna just gently take our little cone out and then look how cute that is. Oh my gosh. Add a little bow. Put it on a pedestal. It's all ready to go. Now, we're gonna just add a little bow at the top. I think probably we could just sit it on top. Honestly, I think that's what I'm gonna do. Make a cute little bow. I've got velvet, which I think is perfect and I love this ruby red color with the orange of the clementine. There you go. That's adorable. Christmas craft check. Okay, now that we have our clementine little tabletop tree done, up next is our framed vintage Christmas cards and I love this one and it's so easy. So, this DIY was inspired by this framed vintage Christmas card that I got from my best friend's mom, I think in like 1999 and I've kept it and I put it out every year and I love it and I love to collect vintage Christmas cards because I think they are so hilarious and nostalgic and I love putting them on top of Christmas presents and displaying them. They're just funny and a lot of times when you find them, they'll be signed by the original giver of the card. This one says Granny. Anyways, they're so cute. So, I have a little collection of them and any time I spot them in an antique store or vintage store, I grab them. They're usually like $2. So, that is what we're doing and I just wanna show you a really easy way to frame them and make them look absolutely gorgeous. So, the first thing is that we're gonna start with an also antique frame. You don't have to have an antique frame but I picked this one up in a state sale and I love it. Grab some really pretty hand marbled paper and then all you have to do is cut your paper to the size of chipboard. I had a piece of glass cut for this frame so it's perfectly sized to the frame. Attached the piece of little vintage card to the front of it with double-sided sticky tape. Framed it up and then I love to layer pieces like this, small pieces of art onto countertops in your kitchen or on a tabletop surface as a part of a holiday vignette and what you need to be able to do that is some type of a tabletop easel. So, I ordered this tabletop easel from Wayfair and it actually came with a set of three. I believe this one's the larger size and it's perfect for this size frame and it's super sturdy and see, I'll just add that to it and I can just pop that piece of art anywhere in the house for the holidays. Now, I just have to say, Wayfair has been helping me win the holidays with these adorable art stands and if y'all saw my video a few weeks back, I amped up the cozy factor in my house with a few new gorgeous chocolate brown lampshades which honestly might be one of my very favorite decor additions that I've made to my house in a really, really long time. So, if you're looking for a shortcut to a cozy, joy-filled December, Wayfair's got you. From decking the halls to hosting holiday gatherings, you're gonna find everything that you need to make the season bright, including a couple of adorable DIY decor and gift ideas. Okay, we've made a decision on our card, this cute one. It goes with that hand-marbled paper perfectly and then I've cut a piece of chipboard to fit inside my antique frame and then, of course, my marbled paper to fit the chipboard. So, I'm just gonna connect it or adhere it with some double-sided tape because it doesn't have to be fancy. You could do it with glue or whatever or Mod Podge, but I love this. Okay, so the hand-marbled paper, I got at a local art store, but you could totally order it online. I know that art supply online stores like Dick Blick carry it and I'm sure other ones. If you have a local art store, I say support your local retailer and shop there, but if you don't, you could order it online. Okay, cute, cute, cute. So, we got that down. So, I went ahead and mounted this Christmas card on just adhesive cardstock that's like burgundy so it had a little bit of a frame around it. I like to eyeball it. You could measure, but I like to live on the wild side and eyeball it. Okay, get it where we want it. Put that on with some double-sided tape. Okay, we're gonna add the glass. So, I had this glass cut to the size of this antique frame because, I mean, it's like a random size. It's not standard because it's antique. So, I just got it cut at my local craft shop and they did it in about three minutes. So, I've got my glass in there. The antique frame's a little bit bent. Okay, and then we're gonna add our piece of Mod Podge. And then, I'm gonna be honest, you could permanently attach this, but I'm just gonna tape it in. Okay, DIY number three, and it is a good one, y'all. It's something that you can keep for years. You can give it as a gift and you can decorate just about every place in your house with it. And that is a natural moss wreath. I had so much fun making these this past weekend and I have got them scattered throughout my house on candlesticks and lamps. It's just a really great, you can put them on the back of the chair. So, the first thing that we're gonna do is start with a wire wreath form. I found that this is easier to use than like a grapevine wreath, but you could totally use a grapevine wreath as well if you wanted to keep it naturalistic. We're gonna need some floral wire and you wanna make sure that it's a dark green color and that it matches your moss. And then this is dried natural moss, okay? This is gonna be so easy. So, we're gonna take a long piece of our floral wire and then just wrap it around your wreath form, whichever kind you decide to get. And I think that this one is like a nine inch. I mean, you could make a really big moss wreath. I kind of wanna do that. Maybe this weekend that'll be my DIY project of the weekend. Okay, then we're gonna take a clump of moss and I like to put a clump on the front and on the back because I want my wreath to be two-sided just in case like if it's on a candlestick, it's in the center of a room, I want the wreath to look pretty from both sides. A lot of times store-bought wreaths, I mean, they don't look pretty from both sides. So, the beauty of making a handmade wreath is that you can make it pretty from both sides. So, I've got that on there and I'm holding it with my hand and then I'm just gonna wrap the floral wire around it to secure it to the wreath form. I kinda like it full. So, you wanna keep your moss pretty full. And look, do you see that? So, we're just gonna keep going all the way around it. Okay, so I'm just keeping going all the way around my wreath form and I kinda like to pack the moss pretty tight because I want it to look full. Seems to work a little better if it's packed fairly tight. I hold it in the front and then I turn it over and I add it to the back as well. And then that way, I can wrap all of that at the same time and just making sure that it covers all of the metal form. Okay, so we finished it off. The great thing about having the floral wire is you can just wrap it back around the metal wire frame. Secure it down in there. The most adorable little moss wreath that you've ever seen. How cute will that be on a candlestick or the back of a chair? Also, the wire frame was probably, I think it was like $2. And I got a massive bag of moss for nine bucks. So, and I think I made three of these little wreaths out of that bag of moss. So cutie, cutie baby wreath. Our last little addition is gonna be to add some floral wire just to be able to hang it. I mean, you could hang it by a ribbon if you wanted to, but this is going on a candlestick. So I wanna be able to like easily attach it. So I've got the floral wire on there. I left it kind of long. So I had some clay. Then of course, nothing is complete without a red ribbon. So I've got my red grosgrain ribbon. I'm just gonna tie a pretty little bow with. And I like to go around the wreath. I just think it makes it look so cute. And I like my ribbons a little floppy, so I'll leave them long. There it goes. Look how cute that is. I'm just gonna add it to this. These are the candlesticks that I have on my mantle. This is the taller of the two, but now that I've got this floral wire, I can just wrap it. I want it about right there. Attach it to my, how cute is that? It looks so good. I love it. For our fourth and final DIY, which I don't know if we would really say it's a DIY, but it is, it is. It's a gardening DIY. We are going to start our amaryllis and paperwhite bulbs. This is a tradition in my house. I absolutely love to have blooming amaryllis and paperwhites all throughout the holiday season. So I started these a few weeks ago. These are my paperwhites. And then today we're gonna do the amaryllis bulbs, which look, they're already shooting out. Now, I love to pot mine in either handmade bowls with really beautiful glazes or antique vessels. I just think it adds a lot of charm. And this is a great gift for the holiday season. You can take them as a hostess gift. You can give them as a Christmas gift. It's just really thoughtful and it's fun, especially if you put them in a really beautiful vessel. So I like to line my vessel with pebbles because it keeps the water kind of off of the bulbs, but it's also easy to see the water level. So I'm just gonna put these down in the bottom of this really cool glazed bowl. Okay, so I've got the pebbles down in the bottom of my bowl just as a little bit of a support for my bulbs. And then now we're gonna add a little bit of potting soil because I wanna be able to nestle the amaryllis bulbs down in it. And I want them to be able to kind of sit proud above the top of my bowl. Got that, now time for our bulbs. We're gonna be so happy they're finally getting planted. So we're gonna put those down kind of nestled in our dirt. Tuck them in, give them their happy home. Make sure that they're straight up because those sprouts are gonna grow tall. And I like to make sure I've got a little bit of room to add some sticks as they start to grow because these are gonna have massive red flowers on them. They're gonna be top heavy. So I will add usually like a branch in the center and take some twine and wrap it around the blooming stems. Okay, so the last thing that I wanna do is just add in some of that moss to make it all pretty and dress it up. And this is gonna be a beautiful centerpiece for a table and bring a little festive color to my living room. There they are. Okay, there you have it. The most adorable holiday DIYs I've ever seen if I do say so myself. Now, these are perfect for decorating your home for the season or also great holiday gifts. Now, if you want to see how I'm styling my home with these pieces as well as the rest of my Christmas decor throughout my entire house, I want you to meet me in this next video. I'll see you there.