Free Decorations

One of my favorite decorations around the holidays is greenery. Wreaths, swags, and roping are so pretty but can be fairly pricey. I decided to make my own greenery this year. I went "shopping" in the yard and found some holly, cedar, and yew. Unfortunately we don't have any pines, so I stopped at the Christmas tree lot down the street from my work. They said I could take as many trimmed branches as I wanted!

I used a few tools we already had-floral wire, pruning shears, and wire cutters. I made a wreath (the one on Purl in my banner picture), but I didn't have any wreath forms and it was a pain in the butt more work than I wanted to do, so I decided to just make swags.


I made 3 plain holly swags for the garage windows.


Then I made three large swags for the barn door and the front porch posts. I also made 2 smaller swags for the front and side doors. I found some red bows I bought last year for next to nothing (after Christmas sales!) and attached them.


I think they look nice.


And they used stuff we already had on hand, so they were free!