free ways of decorating

[AmericasTorturedBrow]

so we are living on nickles and dimes until december 15th and even then it's tight....we've already put aside money for the tree and have an abundance of decorations for it. But our house will not look massively Christmassy so need free (or very very cheap) ideas to decorate for the children

I've scoured our 99p shops and it's all craptastic

I do however have an absolute shit ton of wrapping paper that I thought we could make bunting or at least paper chains out of - but do you just celloptape it to the walls?! We have a fair amount of cotton wool balls too so maybe make several strings of them to hang in the windows?

There aren't really any surfaces or shelves (crappy old rental property) to put things on so wall/window/door decor is probably our limit

Any ideas??!

Blue tack comes off walls, sellotape brings the wallpaper off with it so would work out very much more expensive!

If you mix 99p shop kids poster paint with PVA glue (hopefully also in 99p shop) you get paint thick enough to stick to pine cones, leaves etc. It will wash off with water so you could maybe paint the inside of windows with it too, potato prints of xmas trees and snowmen maybe?

Cut out snowflakes are always a winner, the more the merrier and they don't have to all be white, depending on what coloured paper you can get hold of.

The paper could make concertina chains e.g. of people or stars or whatever, snowflakes, wrap fake little presents to hang or pile up as decoration?

Do you have fairy lights? That's the one thing that makes all the difference when I've done things dead cheap, low lights and some twinkle look so cosy and mean you can't see the crapness of everything else

Try buying arts and crafts in stores with sale items. Since Christmas is approaching, various stores have plenty of cheap offers and even freebies when you purchase any item from them. By using this and your creative ideas, you can personalize your decoration without spending a lot. Plus, you can also search online for free sample products for Christmas, you will get loads of it.

Oooooh multicoloured snowflakes?! Love it!

We do have a fair few fairy lights cos they normally go outside the house, maybe I should bring them in?

Cover toilet roll cardboard tubes with wrapping paper to make 'crackers' which you could string up as part of a garland or individually.

If putting paper snowflakes in the window you can affix with blu tack directly onto the glass.

Paper chains are good, you can make the strips of paper wider for a chunkier look.

did u see any masking tape at the 99p shop, that's good for attaching decs to walls etc, obviously if well hidden.

do you have any jam jars? they look great with little tea lights in.

sellotape paper snowflakes to the windows, it shouldnt mark.

deffo bring the lights in side.

are you near a park or wood? go holly and ivy hunting, decorate the topes of doors and pictures with this, well can go anywhere really. dogwood (red stemmed woody plant) looks great in a vase or jug or what ever you have.

you could do lots of things with wrapping paper, off the top of my head bows? if you cut it into strips and make a bow, I have seen someone make a wreath out of some twigs and bows, they made a circle out of the twigs (willow) is best then they tied ribbon in bows all the way round, looked pretty good, but you also make one with the ivy and holly and hang on the front door if you've got a place, instead of the lights so the house looks christmassy without the lights

do you have Pinterest ? get on there and have a look some great ideas. I might post some for u later

thecountrybasket.com/decorating-for-christmas-family-fun/

have a look at the bottom of the page in the link, they made the fridge into a snowman, I've seen this done on doors as well. if you've got some black paper or dark wrapping paper it might work with a colourful scarf made out of wrapping paper. stick it on with blu tack or masking tape.

A Christingle is apparently a traditional Christian christmas decoration, one I only heard of recently, looks cheap to make. Google image search to see some really nice ones. Packets of candles can usually be found for 99p or so if you're ok with the fire risk, and they look and smell very festive (even the unscented ones still smell of candle).

these are brilliant and you only need paper and sellotape

fir cones are free and look great as decs, either in a bowl or dish on the table, with a few baubles in there to, or in a glass vase.

Oh I love those 3D snowflakes, they're ace!

I think they'd need quite strong paper, which you can get cheaply by finding the cheapest roll of wallpaper in Wilko or somewhere like that. Damaged or end of line rolls often go for only a pound or two, and give you loads and loads of thick paper for crafts - would be perfect for these snowflakes and also you can draw round children to make life-size pictures of them, cut really long strips and curl them with scissors, make a gazillion huge snowflakes, giant origami, all sorts of things.

Check free cycle or gumtree for decorations that people are getting rid of in a house clearance or to make way for new ones.

If you have picture rails then map pins or drawing pins pinned into the recess at the top of them will not do any noticeable damage. Otherwise blue tack to hold things up.

In addition to paper chains and snowflakes that the dcs make each year we also go out into the woods and cut holly and ivy and use florists wire to make garlands to put above the chimney breasts.

I have used ordinary wrapping paper/brown paper to make the snowflakes. THe paper needs to be quite flexible. I have also used ordinary A4 drawing paper cut into squares.

I'd be heading out to look for holly leaves and ivy and pine cones. I have put sticks in a vase and used these as a christmas tree in the childrens room. I then bought very small decorations and a string of lights. In my opinion looks nicer than a cheap fake tree. I will be crocheting some decorations this year as well.

I Know how hard it is and it sucks. Hope you have a fabulous christmas.

These are such wonderful ideas, thank you!

We live in California so holly and ivy and even twigs are few and far between sadly but I didn't think about decorating door frames

We have an absolute shit ton of loo paper rolls so will get on pinteresting that and bring in some of our fairy lights

The major issue we have is display space, no window sills or shelves or coffee table to display candles etc BUT we do have a big fireplace so I'll clear the crap from there and make that a feature

good idea about the fire place.

Can't you wait until December 15th?

That's when most rational people would put up their decorations anyway.

A shit ton is the actual correct unit of measurement for loo rolls.

Maybe you could cut holly and ivy shapes out of paper, they're both quite easy shapes and symmetrical so could be done by folding paper in half.

Mintyy thanks, I didn't know there was an official correct day for putting up xmas decorations. OP may need to start a bit earlier though since (s)he is going to be making it all from scratch for 99p.

I got this idea from my mum...I will be "wrapping" the photo frames/pictures on my wall...the effect is like lots of lovely presents and it's very Christmassy. I also put wrapping into cheap frames for on shelves etc with a little tea light in front of it. I also go mad with the fairy lights and tea lights..Makes such a difference when it's dark.

Oh and we make paper chains and DS1 cuts paper snowflakes.

I will be "wrapping" the photo frames/pictures on my wall...the effect is like lots of lovely presents

Ha ha I love it, that's such a fun idea!

Yes it will take us some time to make and our families arrive on 17th so can't really wait until then to decorate and we're already waiting until then to buy Christmas presents, family staying for 2-3weeks so we prob want to keep our money for that and not decorations!

Besides this is one of the last few years that stuff the DC make will be vaguely cute and not just look a bit shit