Christmas is around the corner and some of us can get a headache over what to use to decorate a Christmas tree at home or in the office. Here are some decor ideas to share that have been put up in HortPark’s Lifestyle Corner for the month of December 2009.
For those of us who are environmentally-friendly and want to avoid buying an imported conifer Christmas tree, one can opt to use any large enough houseplant as a greener substitute. Below is our resident Ficus lyrata ‘Bambino’ which have been dressed for the festive occasion. The usual decorative items apply and we recycled last year’s assortment of colourful baubles for this tree to reinforce a green Christmas.
If you don’t have a plant that is large enough, go out and collect a bunch of fallen branches and twigs from the garden or park and use these to make your very unique and green Christmas arrangement? Proceed to dry them, then spray with gold and silver paint and finally display them in a tall glass container. My colleagues then went on to tie ribbons on the branches and also stuck dry leaves and some store-bought Christmas ornaments to complete the display. We kept in mind that all store-bought Christmas ornaments should be recycable for future use!
Below is another decor idea made using natural materials, which one of my friends shared with my team. If you grow luffas (Luffa cylindrica) in the garden, the sponges obtained from old fruits can also be used as a decorative item on your Christmas tree. All you need to do is to tie and stick a nice ribbon on it and put a string on the top so that you can hang it anywhere you desire!
If you still got some ornamental corn cobs lying around from Halloween, you can use these to adorn your Christmas wreaths! Those displayed in HortPark’s Lifestyle Corner were grown by my team and the cobs matured on the plant just in time for us to use them on the wreath. A warning to all – keep this wreath away from the reach of rodents! Our corn cobs were half eaten as we left them on our office table the night before!
When the festive season is around the corner, we never fail to see loads of nuts being put on sale in our local supermarkets. These oil seeds make very good and apt decor items for the home. Seen below are two styrofoam bells which my colleagues stuck various nuts onto them using hot silicone glue.
Below is another version you can make using almonds. My colleagues cut a star out from a piece of cork bark and then glued the almonds onto it. To add colour, we added red saga seeds onto each one of them. You can use other nuts available for sale in supermarkets to make a similar decor item which you can hang on the wall. These can be stored in a cool, dry place and they can be taken out and used for next year’s festive display.
If you noticed, all the decor items need a fair bit of effort to make them. Gather the entire family or office and join hands to create them. It is a good opportunity to come together whilst making these ornaments, we can all make it a point to catch up amidst the hectic work schedule in the past one year. Incorporate as much recycling ideas as you can into the creation of Christmas decor items to help reduce waste and save our environment during the festive season.
