Green Christmas Tips

The day after Thanksgiving is a big event in my house. It is the day I literally roll down the stairs from being stuffed the day before, pile my breakfast plate with a cold turkey sandwhich and turn on some bowl game football. Once I'm finished filling my face again, the waiting totes of Christmas decorations will make their debut.

This year in my goal to have a green Christmas, we will be "Decking The Halls" in all natural decorations. All the tree trimmings will be handmade.

Garland:

I have LOTS of extra fabric laying around. I took some with matching colors and cut it into strips, then tied it to twine. Easy peasy puddin pie!

Ornaments:

Cinnamon Ornaments: Some of you may remember these as I have made them in the past. They smell so yummy and its soooo easy to make. The hardest part is to wait for them to dry. I'm very excited to have these decorations smelling up my house.

Cinnamon Ornaments

1 Cup Cinnamon
1T Cloves
1T Nutmeg
3/4 C Applesauce
2T White glue

Combine cinnamon, cloves & nutmeg. Add applesauce & glue, stir to combine, work mixture with hands for 2-3 minutes. Divide into 4 parts. Roll each to 1/4" thickness. Use straw or toothpick for hole. Place on wire rack & allow to dry at room temp. Turn after a day. (takes about 2 days to dry).

Salt Dough Ornaments: What a great, all natural way to decorate a tree, not to mention what a great way to get the kids stretching their creative muscles. The kids can do whatever they want to these great ornaments. I'm pretty geeked about this little birdie. Look for upcoming post of our creations.

Salt Dough Ornaments

2 Cups Flour

1 Cup Salt

12 oz Luke warm water

You mix the ingredients together adding just enough of the water to make a supple but not too sticky dough. Then you knead the mixture for 10 minutes. Roll out and use your imagination (or cookie cutters) to create your ornaments. Use a straw to punch a hole in it for hanging. Then the whole lot goes into the oven at 150 degrees c for a few hours until it makes a ringing sound like pottery when tapped. When it's cool you can paint it (preferably with acrylic paint) and with a couple of coats of varnish it can last for many, many years.

Paper Ornaments:

These are so cute and fun. I can't wait to go to Michaels and get some fun paper to use. The kids can even help with the cutting and fastening. Try it for yourself!

Paper Balls

12x12 scrapbook paper (cut into 1cmX40cm paper strips)

Fasteners

Hole punch

For each strip, punch a hole in the center and at each end. Take a fastener and lay it so the prongs are facing upward. Insert some strips of paper through the middle hole onto the fastener. Lay the strips evenly in a star shape. Close the fastener and lay it so that it is parallel with the last (uppermost) strip. Starting with the ends of the uppermost strip, gather both ends by overlapping them and matching the holes. Hold the 2nd brad facing down and insert it through the end holes of the strips. Continue this with the next strips and repeat until all of the strips are gathered. Once you have all of the pieces together, close the fastener off. Tie either a piece of string to the fastener or you can also hang it using wire.

Pinecones:

The boys and I went for a nature walk and picked up as many pinecones as we could carry in our basket. I plan on just tying twine on them and hanging. I also picked up some scented pinecones at the store. They just smell soooo good!

I'm not sure what else I will come up with for our natural decorations, but this will get me started. Hope you find something that you and your little ones can do to have some Green Decorations.