Happy weekend! I hope you’ve enjoyed some relaxing time off. Maybe you’ve been working on your holiday decor? (In case you missed it, my Christmas Home Tour has lots of inspiration!) Perhaps you’re still looking for some simple and inexpensive ways to inject colour into your holiday decor? Today I’m sharing a project that is easy on the skills AND the wallet.
Special thanks to HomeTalk.com and CountryLiving.com for hosting the Home for Christmas DIY hop! I’ll be linking up this post later this evening. Click here to see all of the other #HomeForChristmas projects!
Pinecones are everywhere! Pick up a few and create a trendy and cheerful holiday centrepiece. With just a little paint and patience, you can create decorations that will last through the holidays and into winter.
What you need:
- 7-12 medium or small pinecones
- acrylic paint in a variety of colours (you can also go monochromatic!)
- small paintbrush
- clear glass vase
- Optional: satin ribbon
- Optional: hot glue
- Optional: clear glue or varnish
- Optional: fine glitter
Using acrylic paint, easily found in the dollar store, paint the seed scales (« leaves ») of your pinecone in gradient colours, starting from the lightest and working your way darker. I chose to paint my pinecones in blues because those are my favourite colours. Holiday decor doesn’t have to be red and green to be lovely! Using less « Christmassy » colours adds longevity to your centrepiece. (And of course, blue and white are the colours of Hanukah!)
To assemble my centrepiece, I grouped my painted pinecones in an inexpensive fishbowl vase from the dollar store. To add a romantic glow, you could insert a white pillar candle into the centre of the vase before adding the pinecones.
You could also turn your painted pinecones into beautiful rustic ornaments. To do this, make sure you paint the undersides of the pinecones, so that when you turn the pinecone over you can see all the gorgeous colours. I created two ornaments in different palettes. To make the ribbon hangers, I hot-glued thin satin ribbon to the bottom of the pinecone, making five small loops before glueing one longer, centre loop. Adding glitter to the scales of your pinecones is another way to inject a little sparkle!
(And yes: I photographed my ornaments on a hibiscus… A throwback to my McGill days when we didn’t always have the time/money for a real tree. I promise to photograph these in their rightful pine place of honour just as soon as the tree is up!)
You don’t have to spend much or have access to a lot of craft supplies in order to add some rustic, colourful charm to your holiday decor. Crafting is a great way to release mid-holiday stress, too! Pinecone crafts make lovely inexpensive hostess gifts or stocking stuffers.
I’m looking forward to a somewhat more relaxed week ahead. This year’s Christmas concerts are over and I’m excited to have more time to bring you some holiday DIY projects!
P.S. Don’t forget to enter the Tocara jewelry giveaway and the Fibreartistry needle felting giveaway!
This post was originally featured in the inaugural edition of the Green Paper Leaf Magazine, a publication through York University.
