Christmas in Color DIY

Only two more days until Christmas, can you stand another Christmas decor post? Well this one is totally different from what I did to decorate my house, these decorations went to the store.

As you may know last month I opened a retail space at The Ivy House just outside of Columbia, SC. I have done retail/resale before but took a break while we lived in Germany so when the chance came again I jumped at it, even though I wasn’t totally prepared. I was tasked with filling a 10’x 13′ space in just a few days. I got it looking presentable but I still had a lot space to fill so what better way to fill some space than by getting it ready for Christmas.

At first I was not going to do any decorating at all, I had just moved in and I didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a tree and ornaments but I was at a garage sale and ran across a 3′ vintage tree, made from white feathers, and a tray of silver ornaments for only $4. I figured if I could make the rest of the decor myself I might be able make it work on a tight budget.

For the tree I purchased only one pack of colored ornaments for $7 and the rest I filled fabric flowers and pom poms I made myself. I am a huge fan of crafts I can do while I watch TV in the evenings. I’m terrible at just sitting still so keeping my hands busy means I can actually sit through a show, so these ornaments killed two birds with one stone.

Pom poms are supper easy to make, especially small ones like I used for my tree. I use a fork to loop my yarn the space between the middle tines makes it easy to tie off the middle. You then clip you loops and trim any long threads for a perfect mini pom pom. I tied mine directly to the tree but you could also leave a loop to hang them instead.

The fabric flowers are ones I sell and are a process I have used for a long time. They are pretty simple to make using four, five petaled flowers about 4″ across. I cut from quilting cotton already in my stash. Using a needle and thread I gather each flower around the center to give them dimension. I then stack them and sew them all together a button on top and a little scrap of ribbon on the bottom to give the look of a leaf.  I use an Accuquilt fabric cutter to cut my flower but you can easily cut the flowers by hand using shapes like these.

When the flowers are done I glue gun an alligator clip to the back and clip them on the tree.

With pom poms and flowers of every color my DIY tree is complete.

For the ceiling I decided to create a fabric chandelier for the new space using a wire waste basket I found for $6 and strips of muslin and quilting fabric I looped around each tier of the wire frame.

When I finished covering the waste basket with fabric I added pom poms and fabric flowers along with a string of Christmas lights before hanging it from the ceiling with a chandelier chain.

Have a look at it all installed in the shop, along with bunting and a super easy fabric wall treatment I’ll show you how to install soon.

You can see the look is very colorful but I still have a lot of merchandise to add.

But I’m glad to have a good start and the shop up and running.

I’d say it’s looking pretty good… If your local be sure to stop by for a visit.