Since we did a big remodel of our main living areas this year, I had to completely rethink and redesign our Christmas decor. The biggest challenge was the mantel. We recently moved the TV to hang above the fireplace which meant none of my usual holiday decor would fit in that spot anymore.
The TV is large, but it still left a little bit of room on either side to get creative with for Christmas. Now, in my normal, everyday decor I’m a big fan of simple and neutral. Mostly black and white with touches of green and blush. Nothing too wild. BUT, when it comes to Christmas, I like to let the wild side out. I’m a big fan of bold red and green with touches of lime and pink and yellow. The mantel has always been my main focal point for Christmas decor and I wanted to keep it that way, even with my limited decorating space.
When Hobby Lobby first starting bringing out their Christmas decor (back in JULY) I saw these adorable little multi-colored pom-pom trees. I fell in love, but didn’t want to start buying Christmas YET. I made a mental note of them and they became the inspiration for my new Christmas mantel scene. Small problem was, when I went back at a more seasonably appropriate time to purchase Christmas decor, I couldn’t find the trees!!
Enter: my creative brain and DIY spirit!
I found these lightweight cardboard trees:
And all these pom-poms:
And set out to make my own! Turns out they’re super simple and cost me a lot less to make them myself. So, here’s a quick DIY tutorial on how to make your own.
The cardboard trees were in the Christmas craft section of Hobby Lobby. They are 17in tall and were $5.99/ea, but were 50% off. I found the pom-poms in the aisle with the felt near the kid crafts. Each package was $1.99, but again, 50% off. I got a mixture of 1 in and 0.75 in pom-poms. I ended up getting a lot more than I needed because I wanted so many colors on my trees. You could go a more simple, classic route and get all large green to cover your tree and then a few of the smaller ones to add like ornaments. OR go neutral with different beige tones or just all white! Get creative! In general, you will need 2-3 packages of the 1in pom-poms (80/pkg) and 1 package of the 0.75in (100/package) to cover your 17in tree.
I opened all my pom-pom packages and mixed them up in a bowl so that I could grab them in a very random order to place on my tree.
I tried a few different types of glue and gluing techniques when I first started to figure out which would work best. I settled on regular rubber cement. I like how you can brush it on, it covers well and dried rather quickly. The roll-on glue was too runny and the tacky, craft glue took too long to dry and pom-poms kept falling off.
The easiest technique I found was to brush on the rubber cement in a 2in x 2in area, quickly apply a group of pom-poms one by one and then give it a little hand hug 🙂
Hold your hand over the area, pressing lightly for about 30 seconds. Move on to the next area and continue round and round. Once you’ve gone all the way to the top, you can go back through and fill in any bare gaps. I liked to use the smaller pom-poms to fill in the holes. Just apply the glue directly to the pom-pom and press into place. The first few rows and the last few rows were the trickiest, but overall it was really simple. Each tree took about 45 minutes to assemble.
Even with purchasing way too many pom-poms (I’ve got enough left to do least one more tree) I ended up spending about $8/tree.
What colors are you going to make your pom-pom trees? Are you more traditional or a little bold?
Courtney MaCaire 