Make Your Mailbox A Classic Charmer
If nostalgia is what you value at this time of year, then going the traditional route (aka how your grandma may have gussied up her mailbox) is a solid choice. This arrangement is anchored with cedar boughs and sprigs of cypress and holly. Sugar pinecones are the sweet, statement-making finisher. “They’re massive and gorgeous,” says Birmingham florist and stylist Brooke McAfee. “I love embellishing everything with them at Christmas.”
Draw Them In
Whether guests arrive through the front or back door, make every entry inviting. A perch for removing boots can be a place to gather packages. Mudroom cubbies can display small collections, favorite ornaments, and family heirlooms.
Cheer Up Your Entry Way
Pressed for time but want a big show to greet guests and carolers on your front porch? Fit a 7-gallon magnolia into a decorative planter, and fill in around the edges with spray-painted magnolia branches and sprigs of seeded eucalyptus – we chose red, but gold or silver stuns as well. After the holidays, plant the magnolia in the garden for a year-round token of holiday cheer. Designed to come together quickly and with limited hands-on prep, this Christmas look is easy to tailor for various preferences. Change the plants or colors to suit your taste – Poinsettias are always a good substitute.
Pull Up A Chair
No fireplace? No worries. Hang a stocking from every seat at the table. Use pretty ribbons and double-sided, industrial strength tape to keep the stockings hung behind dining chairs with care.
Wrap Artist
Beautiful presents in festive gift wrap can double as festive decorations under the tree or on a table.
Start Outside
A white brick Colonial is a stately canvas for holiday decorating. The wreaths, swags, garlands, and gate decoration took a color cue from the home’s green-black shutters and bright copper lanterns.
Bring On The Brilliant Berries
For a mix of traditional and modern, use mercury glass teardrop vases to hold bright holly berries, available from florists and garden shops. Leaning on warm orange and red hues, we added some mandarins and pomegranates around the display for texture, color, and fragrance. Kept in fresh water, the berry branches should last up to three weeks.
Get Festive With Place Card Holders
Instead of displaying dining room name cards on simple card holders, make them festive! This holiday host enlisted her childhood collection of Steinbach nutcrackers to hold gold-scripted place cards that match the holiday dinner menu cards. Use a gold paint pen for metallic penmanship, and adorn the top with a gold foil holly sprig.
Add Another Layer
Give your stocking or sideboard a bit of extra sparkle with a tassel that’s subtly fragrant too. Start by gathering five magnolia leaves, two other kinds of evergreens (we used cypress and pine), spiral eucalyptus, and a cluster of berries. Position the grouping so the magnolia acts as the backdrop; this will give the arrangement structure. When you like the look, secure the base of the stems with florist tape. Wrap a piece of ribbon around the tape, knotting it off once the bottoms of the stems have been almost completely covered. Use the loose ends to create a loop large enough to fit over your stocking holder, drawer pull, or knob. Knot again to secure, and then let the tails hang down. Trim them so they hit just above the end of the greenery for a hint of movement and a soft touch.
Make an Entrance
Make your entrance inviting for all. Dress the staircase with a garland of pinecones, greenery, and ribbons of alpine blue.
Create an Evergreen Centerpiece
Bring the Christmas forest inside your house with this rustic, homey arrangement. Use a footed silver serving tray to display a sumptuous centerpiece with vintage ornaments and clippings from the garden. Start with Southern classics: boxwood, pine, and magnolia. Next add large ball ornaments, followed by crocosmia pods, pinecones, and abelia whose flowers have dropped, leaving a showy flourish of pink sepals on the tips of branches. Finish with delicate sprigs of evergreens, dried shelf mushrooms attached to florist picks. Wire a few small, round ornaments of natural colors with metallic and glossy finishes in for a subtle touch of glamour.
Top Your Mantel with Winter Blooms
Maintaining a quality collection of fluted vases, julep cups, and chalices makes it easy to display (and replace) choice blooms throughout the season. Update your mantel with fresh winter blooms. The foliage base will take you well past New Year’s; and the flowers will last five days. To create this look, begin with a base of artificial garland. Then tuck in layers of two kinds of fresh eucalyptus (silver dollar and seeded), as well as dusty miller placed in water tubes. Add silver brunia, white ranunculus, star of Bethlehem, ‘Sahara’ roses, eucalyptus pods, succulents, and snowberries to vases and along the mantel.
Make It Miniature
Petite wreaths come together in a snap to dress up empty tabletops. A few sprigs of pine, rosemary, or cypress are the essential elements.
For a horseshoe-shape, strip the needles from the bottom inch of two pieces of greenery; then overlap the stripped sections so the needles of each clipping point in opposite directions. Place that on a piece of florist wire that’s been trimmed to a length about ½ inch shorter than the stems. Using dark green florist tape, attach the stripped portions to the wire. Gently bend the wire to make a horseshoe shape, and then manipulate the greenery to follow suit, bending and securing it to the wire with florist tape as needed. Finish it with a bow tied around the wreath’s center to hide the construction.
For the Wreath, using florist wire, make a ring and then bend the wire back around itself to secure. Cover with greenery (with needles pointing in the same direction), and attach to the form with florist tape. Add a bow.
An Arrangement To Outlast the Holidays
Let the celebratory spirit linger by pairing sunny, sturdy amaryllis with poinsettias. Place the display on an entry console or a sideboard as an alternative to a tiny tabletop tree. These potted pretties also make thoughtful gifts for friends and neighbors. Repot an amaryllis and a mini poinsettia in a shallow vessel, and then cover the soil with moss. Snugly nestle pomegranates at the base of the flowers, and add berry-covered branches for extra pops of red. Extend the impact by placing loose fruit on the table below.
Think of a Novel Idea
For a hint of holiday flair with a literary touch, put spare paperbacks to work by stacking them into a Christmas tree. It’s a wonderfully whimsical touch to a mantle or bookshelf.
Sneak in Surprises
Shift into neutral for a simple bouquet that incorporates natural colors and textures. You’ll need cedar, spiral eucalyptus, dusty miller, and a branch holding a trio of petite pinecones to create this look. It can add unexpected charm to a bookshelf, bedside table, or windowsill. This petite bouquet will make a lovely host gift, or put together multiples for giving away at your holiday luncheon.
Extend a Warm Welcome
Our favorite way to light up any season is a brilliant array of paper luminaries. Line them up along your front walkway, along your driveway, or scatter them on your porch for a bright, twinkling Christmas display that’s so simple and affordable to pull off. You can buy premade luminaries in bulk online, or make your own using white paper bags, pebbles, and battery-powered LED candle lights. After gathering your supplies, place a handful of pebbles in the bottom of your paper bag so it is less likely to blow away or fall over. Using your fingers, clear a place for the LED light (turned on) to rest. Wait until its dark out, and you have a glowing luminary to light up your drive.
Choose a Gift Wrapping Style
The bigger your Southern family, the harder it is for you to find and purchase personalized gifts for everyone. If you don’t have a spectacular gift – or even if you do! – the best way to make your gift more exciting is by spending a little more time on the packaging. These creative Christmas wrapping ideas are perfect for any gift. Choose a theme – traditional, natural, vintage, glitzy, coastal, or rustic – you can’t go wrong. Purchase small trinkets for decorative touch, like the wooden reindeer, glittery initial, cotton clipping, or bell and ornament pictured above. By layering paper, ribbon, and tags, you can create a picture-perfect package.
Consider Cool Jewel Tones
Stems of pussy willow adds some height to a simple arrangement of pine branches with cones, displayed in an antique blue pickle jar. (Find these online or at thrift stores.) A turquoise ribbon complements the colored jar and the decorative Christmas trees. The limes accentuate the green tones from the branches and connect them to the base, a large pewter tray that offers a bit of shimmer without the shine of silver.
Let the Tree Tell Your Story
Adorn your tree with meaningful ornaments, like these which were collected during the family’s travels. Finish your design with cascading blue and red velvet ribbons.
Entertain with Bold Red Accents
Muted colors with printed seasonal menus and gold ribbons pair wonderfully with pops of Christmas reds.
Match Gift Tags to Your Color Scheme
A true Southern decorator knows just how important a well-wrapped gift is, and you will never catch us wrapping our gifts in computer paper. For family gatherings, make the exterior of your gifts look just as good as the presents that lie inside. The bonus is that, until you give the gifts to their recipients, they will add class to your living room while they wait under your tree. Pair preprinted gift tags that reinforce your decor scheme with boxes wrapped in chocolate and metallic papers to add character under the tree. You can get even more creative by designing and printing your own tags with a Cricut machine.
Welcome with Wreaths
Greenery can make a big impact, even outside. Add window wreaths with ribbon to each window of your home, and don’t forget the doorway. Make an extra special entry by creating an evergreen border to your front door.
Decorate with Family Heirlooms
The next time you are handed down a beautiful piece of family furniture from an elder, don’t forsake it because you don’t have the room. Save these heirlooms for seasonal occasions, and use them in your Christmas decorating. Showcase them during the most wonderful time of the year by putting them on display. This mahogany buffet may not be useful all year round, but during the holiday season, it is a perfect place to serve Christmas brunch. It fits perfectly into a niche built just for it. Update the pieces with modern accessories, such as a pair of mod white lamps, which help a traditional piece of furniture blend seamlessly with more modern tastes.
Strike a Posy
Let the magnolia leaves dictate the size and shape of each arrangement, but keep them small in scale so they don’t overwhelm the place setting. From there, the equation is simple: two magnolia leaves, a sprig of cedar and/or pine for texture, and berries on top for a pop of color. A handful of foraged leaves (we opted for deep purple foliage to contrast with the bright green magnolia) can fill in any holes. Secure with florist tape at the base, and then wrap the bottom with a velvet ribbon—bonus points for selecting a shade that coordinates with your china. As you put these together, alternate showing off the fronts and backs of magnolia leaves for added interest.
Branch Out
Nestle evergreen clippings in a bar cart for fresh accents.
Wow with Regional Touches
Hang pine garland, velvet bows, pinecones, and pheasant feathers along your banister for an entry guests won’t soon forget.
Welcome Guests in Memorable Southern Style
Upgrade your entryway by twirling topiaries with fruit. Start with two bonbon compotes. Hot-glue sheet moss to a plastic-foam cone. Stick florist clay adhesive to the bottom of the compote, and press the cone onto it. Attach a row of green plums (or Key limes) by skewering with a wooden pick and inserting into cone in an upward swirl. Glue scabiosa pods and dried hydrangea blossoms next. Repeat. Skewer a pineapple (spray-painted gold) with a wooden pick, and insert into top of topiary. Try spray-painting the dried hydrangeas white for an elegant touch.
Get Creative with Gift Tags
Save money and add a personal touch by making your own Christmas gift tags. Kids love getting to craft their own unique tags. Pictured above, the crafty holiday homemaker used a color copier to make copies of tartan fabric, and then cut the copies it into rectangles to create each patterned gift tags. You can also print background patterns from the Internet and make simple designs using your computer. Type or handwrite names in the center. Add ribbons and bells to dress up each gift. Choose wrapping paper and patterns that match your room’s decor, as these gifts will be waiting under the tree for the whole Christmas season.
Bring Comfort and Joy
Bottle trees and a bit of greenery zip-tied to the bamboo headboard shift the guest room into festive mode without much upkeep.
Savor Travel Memories
Extend the festivities to empty corners. A framed collage of pages from expired passports sets an adventurous backdrop for a colorful tree decorated with garland and accents inspired by far-flung locales.
Cluster Ornaments
This Christmas tree secret is ingenious, easy, and cheap. Cluster small ornaments together for an extravagant impact. Small ornaments can easily get lost on a busy tree amid the sparkling lights and merry garland. Using thread or fishing wire, simply thread a cluster of ornaments together and tie to make an eye-catching arrangement. Hang them on your tree sporadically for shiny upgrades – we love adding a bell or two for some jingle. Incorporate the same individual small ornaments throughout the tree to echo the larger displays. You can also hang these festive ornamental clusters around your house, such as on wreaths or from your mantel.
Bring In the Greens
Play up one color for extra impact. We paired clear glass containers with fruit, foliage, and ribbon in a fresh shade for an unexpected display. Arrange camellia branches in one water-filled vase and naked seeded eucalyptus in another. Place a mound of apples beneath a glass bowl. Accent with contrasting ornaments and tiny battery-powered fairy lights.
Set Out Small Seasonal Displays
Place ornaments and antlers in a versatile vessel, like an antique dough bowl, anywhere around the house for a small dose of cheer. It works wonders on an entry table or atop a mantel.
