TRADITIONAL CHRISTMAS DECOR ON A BUDGET

The weather outside is frightful and I’ve had a chill in my bones for weeks now. It must be Christmas time! This year, I’m dedicated to decorating my home in a cheerful and seasonal aesthetic but without all the headaches of over-the-top decor. I don’t have a lot of spare time. I don’t have a lot of spare money. So I’m doing my best to incorporate our existing decor into our (new-to-us) home.

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Christmas Home Tour: How To Decorate with Traditional Holiday Decor On A Budget

Luckily, I have totes of Christmas decor that get stored away every year, so I didn’t have to look very far. Remember that our current living room looks like this?

Back in the Fall, I laid the foundation of my Winter season decor by adding a collection of vintage items and eucalyptus garland to the mantel. You can see more of the additions I made in this post. Now that Winter’s in full swing, I removed the pumpkins and started adding in red touches.

I started with a few pieces of silk florals and a fresh amaryllis bulb. You can find these affordable faux amaryllis stems here.

I love how well the Amaryllis red works with differing shades of blue. It’s especially festive when paired with a navy tartan pillow. I opted to keep my usual Chinoiserie pillow covers throughout Winter because I think they look great with my Christmas decor. The plaid pillow covers are inexpensive finds from Ikea while the brush stroke vase is a $1 DIY made from this tutorial.

Since we already had these stockings, I knew the red would work perfectly to bring out the needlepoint and velvet touches. So Wintery!

And even though I know I’m not supposed to, I just can’t not show you this because it’s soooooo quaint. So, here’s how it looks at night.

Adorable, right?! Not too Christmasy, but also not completely ignoring the season!

Here are the additions I made in the kitchen.

Christmas decor in the kitchen: This one is simple. Adding a few cookie cutters to string creates a festive garland. The tutorial is in this post along with a ton of simple Christmas gift tags you can DIY and use as ornaments.

Simple seasonal touches add a big impact in a kitchen. Here, I’ve opted to display candy canes (my favorite treat!) in a large jar and added some greenery from my own yard.

Christmas decor in a kitchen doesn’t need to be overstated. These items keep the room feeling cozy but not cluttered.

I’ve also carried the Christmas decor into my kitchen by adding a red and white striped hand towel in the place of my usual blue linen cloth. We already had this one from Williams Sonoma on hand, but here’s one I love that’s under $4!

Lastly, I added a tartan plaid scarf to my kitchen table to create a little coziness. It doesn’t fit as a total tablecloth, but I still like the look. Here’s a very similar and inexpensive option.

DIY TUTORIALS 2

Now onto the show-stopper! The Christmas tree!!

If you follow me on Instagram and watch my stories, you know two things: I hemmed and hawed about the correct placement of this tree for a few weeks and I am absolutely madly in love with this Christmas tree that we bought last year. It has a ton of color and twinkle options – PLUS A REMOTE – and it’s LED so it saves money!

After all the back and forth, we finally decided to put the Christmas tree in our foyer and I love it! This otherwise unused and blank space gets a fresh pop with the twirling lights and red and white color scheme.

I didn’t have any additional amaryllis on-hand, but I did have a ton of silk poinsettia blooms leftover from our last home’s porch decor. So I decided to make a poinsettia garland to bring in the red.

Poinsettia blooms tucked into a Christmas tree make a huge impact as a garland. You don’t even have to string them! Just tuck them in a line and it’ll look like a garland!

I did run out to buy a few more of these, which were under $1 a piece when purchased as a bush and then removed from the stems. You can find the red ones here.

As you can see from that photo above, I didn’t have enough to go all the way around the tree, but who cares?! It looks good from the front, where visitors and partygoers will see it!

Then I used five of the poinsettia blooms to top the tree. This is my favorite view.

I love how the red ties in so beautifully throughout the house!

Notice I also added a little piece of Winter artwork? That’s a Currier & Ives print I had leftover from a calendar I purchased for my mother-in-law but didn’t use.

I used some leftover garland to make a small wreath, tied with a white ribbon, to hang on our powder room door. Since we’re entertaining over the holidays, I find that adding this touch helps guests navigate the house. When they ask for the restroom location, I simply tell them it’s in the foyer – the one with the wreath on it.

I also added some faux greenery garland to the staircase railing. This year, I mixed it up by using a base of artificial fir garland, like this one here (which is even lit so you can add extra flair) and then added in this cheap eucalyptus garland to tie into the garland from the living room. I’m still in the process of hanging the stockings, but this look should be complete by the party tomorrow night. I’ll report back.

For now, can we just bask in the glory of this gorgeous space?

We had to temporarily move the console table out of the foyer to make room for the tree. The wall behind the sofa was a perfect landing spot and will make a great champagne bar for this weekend’s cocktail party.

I’m actually very charmed by the reflection of this room in the mirror.

If you’ve spotted anything in these rooms that I haven’t linked, you can click below to shop my house.

All tallied, I spend less than $50 and added some great touches that really enhance my existing decor. In the past, I’ve swapped everything around but as I get older, I just want to celebrate my decor instead of changing it out every three months. You know?

Happy Holidays + xoxo
Teri

UPDATE 2019: WE’VE MOVED!
click to see how our full suburban home tour

YOU’VE GOT QUESTIONS + I’VE GOT ANSWERS

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