I love Christmas! I love the trees, the garlands, the wreaths. Love them. All.  Last year I made a fresh garland and wreath, because we had to cut several branches off the tree so we could get it in our tree stand.

This year, I don’t have a tree yet, and won’t be getting one until we get back from Vegas. So this year I bought the things to make a full, gorgeous and inexpensive garland. The only thing that would make it better would be pheasant tail feathers, and you’d think that I could find some of those since they’re (pheasants) everywhere. Including out my front window. But regardless, I’ll show you step by step how I made it for under $25.00. That’s right, ladies and gents, I said under $25.00.

I took photographs at nearly every stage, so you can see how it comes to life; but bear with me, the lighting changed during the process, and I don’t know that I adjusted the  camera for that so we’ll see. Also of note- I don’t have a mantel, yet (it’s on Zach’s to do list this year- as well as putting in a gas fireplace for us) so I used this beautiful handmade table that I picked up at a store in Stephenville, Texas. It’s a one of a kind piece, that we use as our bar. And this is what will hold our stockings. I currently only have two stockings but my trip to Vegas should rectify that, as I hope to bring home some cowhide stockings. Now, on to the project.

A sneak peek at where this is going:

Step one: We will start with a plain, simple and inexpensive, nine foot garland. I picked this one up at Hobby Lobby for $3.99 (as it was 50% off )- in fact every piece that I use in this was 50% off.

You should notice from the first photo that the side closest to the window has been fluffed: warning, contents may mash during shipping. So make sure that you touch every single branch and bring them to life, so to speak.

Next, we want to make this sad, pitiful garland, look full and happy so we’ll add five of these:

Now that that is done, we’ll add in 4 of these- 2 we’ll save for later.

To insert these, and those previously shown above,  I will bend the wires that they’re on securing them with 25 gauge florist wire where necessary to help them stay in place, and to hide the stems. I added these pieces of  faux white pine to places where the faux pine cone greenery wasn’t.  You want to try to space them evenly. I left the tails of my garland a bit sparser as I wanted it to taper down gracefully. You wouldn’t have to. You could use a couple pieces more of each type and make it really full. But because of where mine sits it would have made it more likely to get knocked off the table (mine sits next to our dining room table).

I used four- two in each corner to really fluff them up. You’ll want to make sure that you bend and fluff the stems of the white pine for maximum effect.

Once those were in, I added lights. I used a string of 100.  As a general rule of thumb you want 100 lights per foot of tree, so I figured since we weren’t wrapping them, per say, 100 lights would cover 9 feet, quite nicely. If you look closely you can see, in the above photo, my extension cord which is tied to the table so as to hide it. I’ll start on the far side and work the lights in.

Don’t forget that the lights do stretch, so take that into consideration when wrapping them in. I used florist wire again, as well as the branches of my garland to work them in and hold them in place. Ideally we’d like to be able to not see the string of lights. At all.

Now we should add in the two remaining white pine stems- I put them behind the two stars in the center and then we’ll throw some berries in for color. I used two different colors- a bright red and more a merlot color. In total there are 6 stems of berries used.

I also added some extra pine-cones. I gathered these from the cemetary where we buried grandma this fall, and knew I’d use them for Christmas crafts.

Here are the two best views I could get photos of short of moving a heavy, handmade dining room table.

I have a couple other projects planned for things to go on this table, and I also have a wreath to build and possibly more garlands, so as those projects transpire, I’ll be sure to do step-by-step on them as well.

Have fun, folks, and remember the sky is the limit!  You could use glass balls, tied together in groups of 3-5, you could also use ribbon and weave that throughout and if you didn’t want the the tails to be so long, there is no rule that says you can’t fold the garland in half and use it that way. In fact if you were to do that, that would make it even fuller! If you create your own garlands, please let me know! I’d love to see how creative all y’all are and how this inspired you!