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How to accessorise your home at Christmas
This year has not been much fun for anyone. Not only are we currently in Lockdown 2 when we should be getting excited about Christmas and all the fun it usually brings, many of us are worrying about our jobs, and how we're going to afford the festive season at all. The good news is, it is possible to accessorise your home with beautiful Christmas decorations that you can make yourself or buy very cheaply. This means you can still make a magical display without worrying that you have overspent on something you only put up for a few weeks a year. It is a great way to keep the kids occupied when the schools break up and will help them realise that Christmas is happening after all.
A Covid Christmas means that we might not be able to see our friends and families indoors at home, and if we meet outside, we will have to observe social distancing legislation to keep each other safe. However, bringing some of the magic of Christmas to others by having the background of a cosy and festive home when Christmas video calling means that you can still spread a little festive cheer to others without being in the same room. You can even Zoom Santa
this year, so even if you cannot see the big man face to face, a virtual Santa visit is possible.
Plants and Flowers
Not a lot is in bloom in midwinter, but it is an excellent time of year to find evergreens with rich red berries, and even sprigs of mistletoe. Go for a walk as a family and collect holly, twigs, and anything else that looks decorative. If you have got a lavender plant, a few sprigs twisted into greenery for a wreath shape can smell as well as look stunning. If you want a little colour, add cheap dried flowers, or even small baubles to brighten displays. Fake snow or eco-friendly glitter can make a display sparkle if you want it to catch the light.
Christmas Fragrance
Smells like cinnamon and cloves go together with Christmas, and it is easy to give your home a festive fragrance with these spices. Take a few oranges and a jar of cloves and press the cloves stem side down into the oranges until just the head is visible. Continue until the orange is well covered. Display in a fruit bowl with a few sticks of cinnamon. If you make your clove oranges in the week before Christmas, they should last you into the New Year.
Tree Decorations
Dried orange slices and cinnamon sticks can also make stylish and fragrant tree decorations. Thread them on twine for a rustic look. If you are missing sparkle, paint glue around the rind of each orange slice and roll them in a little eco-friendly glitter to catch the light. If you are handy with a needle and thread, scraps of felt in Christmassy colours can be stitched into embroidered baubles or star shapes.
Paper Chains
Those of us who are old enough to remember Christmas in the 1970s will have a lasting fondness for paper chains. We would have sat making them early in December and been excited to see them strung all over the house in the run up to Christmas. Sugar paper in bright colours is great for making paper chains - cut the paper into strips about five inches long and one inch wide and arm yourself with a good paper glue. The best thing of all, is these are fully recyclable when the Christmas decorations come down in January.
Christmas Stockings
Got a lot of brightly coloured socks that have lost their pair in the wash? For some reason, it always seems difficult to throw these away, so here is a great use for them which the kids can help with.
You can either make a Christmas stocking garland with a sock for each member of the family, or, if you've got 24, you can make a sock advent calendar (we've already looked at how to make another advent calendar). Decorate any dull socks with Christmas shapes cut from felt, or with Christmas ribbon until they look suitably festive. Stuff with small presents, messages, or sweets, and enjoy.
Decorate Yourselves!
If you are not wearing Christmas jumpers, is it even really Christmas at all? You need Santa hats and reindeer antlers to go with those of course, so either pick them up cheaply in your local pound shop or get crafting and make them yourselves.
One thing we would usually do at this time of year is take the children to meet Santa in Santa's grotto. However, the need to remain socially distanced this year means that seeing Santa live is not possible. All is not lost as Santa has got to grips with technology and is a whizz with Zoom, as we all are now. So that children know that it's still Christmas and that he is still thinking about them, he would like to speak to as many of them as he can and hear all about their plans for Christmas and how they're helping the grown ups decorate the house for Christmas.
To arrange a live video call with Santa, just book a time when all the family can see Santa together, and in a 10 minute video call you can let him know what you'd like for Christmas, and get the inside gossip on important things like how reindeer fly, and what they like to eat on Christmas Eve.
You can even think about a special display you might want in the background - perhaps make some Christmas angels with wooden clothes pegs and paper doilies, or make them cloth dresses and wings to make them a bit more permanent.
This will definitely be a very different Christmas, but there is no reason for it not to be a great Christmas. Get crafting and get creative and bring some Christmas magic into your home with some stylish homemade accessories and a call to Santa at the North Pole.
Chief Elf (James Bartlett) of Santa's Calling You has been shortlisted as a finalist for the Great British Entrepreneur Awards - Creative Entrepreneur of the Year!
The Grotto is Open! But here’s why it’s still better to book your guaranteed video call with Santa and stay COVID safe this Christmas.
One treat the whole family can enjoy is our new Secret Santa Box, available as an add-on to your video call with Santa. Packed full with items for the whole family to enjoy together, the Secret Santa Box enhances our message that ‘it is not what is under the Christmas Tree that matters, but what is around it that counts’.
