Christmas Decorations! Help!

[LozC0411]

Hi everyone, I am moving into my own place in October with my partner, we are also expecting a baby and I am a huge lover of Christmas.
I want help on where to get Christmas decorations from and a nice tree (fake), I like traditional colours, don't like glitter and sparkles etc as I'm not a big fan of modern decorations themes. Not on a huge budget as now have bills to pay and buying baby things but not trying to do it really cheap either, any help is appreciated!

There's a good selection of vintage decorations on ebay, if I was starting out I'd go there. You could also make some decorations, there are lots of ideas on line from origami, pom poms, felted creations, strings of popcorn etc etc.

Garden centres are pretty good.

The Range usually has a huge selection of surprisingly high quality baubles at very good value. Our local store has them all out already. I’m not so sure about the trees I’ve seen there, but don’t dismiss the value options!

I’m really fussy about my trees but often find the best high street ones are the higher end supermarket ones! Definitely try and see a display one before buying though.

I think that if you like traditional decs then I would plan to collect them over a few years and not try and get them all this year.

Nice decs are not cheap. So set a budget for this year the unusual/pretty decs, and buy that amount now. I would then also buy a box of standard baubles, eg a box of 20 plain red or gold baubles, and fill the tree with that and then they can gradually go as you buy your pretty ones over the next few years.

Garden centres (Dobbies), The Range, John Lewis, and the supermarkets all have a good selections, and lots of styles and colours.
I would chose a style (eg victorian style, or 'natural' - felts and wooden, or all patterned baubles) or a colour theme (I do red, green and gold) and then shop around in different places.

I started off with a tiny tree the first year DH and I lived together and a gold, silver and blue colour theme, each bauble was different. I've bought or made one or two more decorations each year, and then as we had children started including the ones they made. 25 years later we now have a LOT of decorations and a small tree in the sitting room with my favourite glass baubles and a big tree in the playroom with every kind of decoration imaginable that is decorated by the kids. We love taking out all the old decorations each year.

I didn't think about eBay! Thank you :)

I agree, I think I'll get a few bits from the garden centre, it's just very expensive

I know there's good value options. I'm not going to close myself off from them, I'm just not on a massively tight budget and I feel with some shops there's a lot more 'modern' things that aren't really very traditional

Definitely! I'd like to see it assembled before buying it so I'm not tree catfished lol 😂I want a green tree, but I like them to look full and not really thin and gappy

My family have always brought a few very nice ones each year to build up a collection to pass on which I would like to continue as well as the sets you can get in the shops, I just don't want really modern, glitzy ones as it wouldn't match with the more traditional ones. Red, green and gold sounds gorgeous as well, love those colours!!

IKEA. The decorations look very old/traditional. I bought a few boxes as a student on a budget and I still have them! Really good quality, glass baubles, wooden figurines. I was quite upset when I smashed one of them last year!

Silver, gold and blue sounds lovely! I have been thinking about a dark, royal blue for a colour to include.. I don't want a small tree but also wont really have room for a massive one either, I'm planning on having it a couple of years as well, as buying new every year adds up in price

If I was starting I would pick a colour theme and buy a few boxes of basic baubles in those colours to start off with. And then buy a few nicer baubles and make it an annual tradition to buy a few nice ones each year. Also there can be good reductions in the after Christmas sales too.

I tend to chop and change but I keep everything and just some years I do different things, I have a vast collection collected over 35 years.

Places like Home Sense sometimes have some nice thing too.

I like the idea of a dark blue and gold, which I'm definitely going to look at, my family also do the tradition of buying a few nice ones a year so I really want to continue that myself... I did notice that Home Sense and TK Max have started to bring out some lovely xmas bits, so may have to go and look there when more comes out. Thank you!

If you crochet you can easily and quickly make lots of traditional decorations such as snowflakes and baubles like this

www.anniedesigncrochet.com/free-christmas-baubles-pattern/

I love this idea however I'm not really an artsy person, nor do I know how to crochet😫

@MissSkegness1951 those crocheted ones are lovely. We've got pompom robins the DC made years ago that I love (very easy to make @LozC0411 , no crafty skills required).

They are lovely @MissSkegness1951! I can’t crochet either sadly.

Blue and gold sounds lovely @LozC0411.

I like the sound of no crafty skills required😂I'm open to anything that I'm able to do so this is really helpful

Thank you ! Or I like the sound of red and gold too, I'm still somewhat undecided

I love paper decorations and have a big collection of new and vintage. You can get tiny paper fans, wheels and honeycomb shapes that you can hang from tree branches. They come in a big range if colours and look lovely alongside more traditional baubles.

Another thing I like to do is drape paper chains around the tree. Again, you can get them in whichever colour scheme you like. Last year I made my own from old music sheets.

I'll find some links.

https://www.studiothie.com/products/honeycomb-ball-5cm-rainbow-set-of-6

I bought a couple of gorgeous fake trees from Homebase. But I got them in January when they were seriously discounted.

Vintage paper decorations

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/135276396204?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=foMkE0goTz2&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY