Easy Holiday Decorating With Fresh Greenery

 

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If you’re looking for easy and natural holiday decorating for your home’s front door and exterior, this post may give you ideas that will help.

Two Decembers back, I finally retired my faded faux garlands I had used to deck out my Christmas porch for many years. Instead, I decided to try evergreen garlands for the first time.

The main motivator was that my house was added to the Napa historic society house tour very last minute, and I was desperate. (So was the historic society or else they wouldn’t have put my house on the tour.) I quickly threw up a cedar garland around my front door, added a wreath, and called it done.

Now I’ve expanded on that idea by adding more garlands, pinecones, and evergreen cuttings to the porch along with a DIY door swag. Plus some low key fairy lighting.

I found this was waaay less hassle than all those previous years of hauling out ladders for light stringing and faux-garland wrangling up in the eaves. And - big bonus - I like the look better!

Ladder-free is key for me. I’m not afraid of heights, I just don’t have the time or the inclination. If you’re a busy single mom like me and decking the halls a la’ Chevy Chase in Christmas Vacation is NOT in the cards, give some of these ideas a try.

 

How to hang live cedar garland around the front door

First I measured around my door frame to estimate the amount of garland I’d need. If you’re in the Napa area, you can buy live cedar garland by the foot at Van Winden's Garden Center or you can buy cedar garland in pre-cut 15’ increments at Home Depot.

I bought 18’ of garland so it almost reaches the ground - my door frame is wider than average though.

Armed with a hammer and some long, skinny finishing nails, I hauled a kitchen chair onto my porch, climbed up, and put about 3 nails into the top of my door frame to hold the garland in place - left, center, and right.

The nails aren’t really noticeable when it’s not Christmas unless you look straight up, but you’re concerned, you could go the extra mile and paint the nails the color of your house to make them blend even better.

Then I hauled the garland up and got it in place with only minimal hassle and swearing.

I hung 18’ of live cedar garland around my front door secured by 3 long, skinny nails positioned left, center, and right on top of the door frame.

 

I also made a door swag. I bought greenery and silver dollar eucalyptus from Trader Joes. I supplemented by trimming from the neighborhood redwood street trees. Holly or other red berries would be another beautiful, festive addition.

Read all about it at How To Make A Christmas Evergreen Swag [Easy Holiday DIY].

 

Natural vs. Faux Garlands

Quick note about natural versus faux. Both are beautiful; they’re just different looks. Investment-wise, faux garlands vary a lot in price. The live cedar garland runs about $24.99 for 15’ in-store at the time of writing and some of the nicest live and faux options I’ve seen online.

Faux will eventually get weather beaten and need to be replaced. Live greenery goes in the yard waste bin for a future life as free soil (courtesy of Napa county) first of the new year.

Faux works better for wrapping around a banister for example, but hanging it around your door frame might be challenging. It’s usually much wider/thicker than a live cedar garland, so my three discreet nails won’t do the job of keeping most of them in place over the top of my door.

 

SHOP THE LOOK

 

Trimming the rest of the porch with (mostly free) greenery

I bought a few more feet of garland and placed it along the back of my black Chinese Chippendale style porch bench.

Buying a ton of greenery would get expensive though, so I got resourceful. I ran over to the street in my hood known as the “Avenue of Redwoods” and clipped redwood sprouts from the base of the street trees.

Coastal redwoods are enormous trees that produce water sprouts all around the base requiring constant pruning and shearing, otherwise the sprouts can easily grow as tall as me. (see below)

My other go-to source for free greenery is collecting the Christmas tree lot trimmings. You know how they trim the base of the tree for you at the Christmas tree lot? Just ask them if you can help yourself to that lovely pile of Christmas tree scraps, take some home, and clip off what you need.

Cedar garland over the porch bench and neighborhood redwood clippings in a decorative steel bin.

 
 

If you have other evergreen foliage like juniper, cypress, magnolia, holly, laurel, yew, eucalyptus, etc. in your garden, those work great too!

Doesn’t have to be the traditional cold-climate conifers. Think outside of the boxwood! (#sorrynotsorry 😅)

I put the clippings in a plastic bucket with water and put the bucket inside of a rustic metal bin I bought locally at Brick & Mantel. (If using a steel bin that will rust like this one, be sure to put it on a “porch coaster” of some sort underneath since the last thing you want to do in the new year is remove rust stains.)

Boys and I collected a number of sugar pine cones years ago from their relative’s property. These are really beautiful and I use them year-round. They’ve held up perfectly too, so if you’d like to add them to your holiday décor, don’t hesitate.

Found sugar pine cones, neighborhood redwood clippings, and some cedar that fell off the garland in a wooden bowl. The mossy branch is a permanent fixture on the porch.

 

SHOP THE LOOK

 

Finally, I added some lighting. I actually found a fairy light set in my drawer and wove it around the door swag. Then I decided I needed to do the bench, so I order another couple sets from Amazon. All use triple A batteries with an off and on switch.

 

I added fairy lights to my evergreen swag and the cedar garland on the porch bench.

 
 

Voila! Holiday porch decorating done. Once I got it figured out, it didn’t take much time at all. Rinse and repeat next year!

I liked my greenery so much it was the holiday card setting!

 

Christmas greenery decorating backstory

JIC you’re curious to know about the history behind all of this Christmas greenery, here’s a little write-up:

Did you know our holiday tradition of “deck the halls with boughs of holly” has its’ roots in early paganism?. It’s true. Much of what we consider Christmas decorating was in fact adapted from earlier pagan traditions. The church decided it was a wiser strategy to integrate pagan traditions with Christianity rather than try to ban winter solstice festivities outright. Smart!

Yuletide decorating like putting evergreen swags and boughs over doorways and around the house began long before Christianity, with pagans celebrating the winter solstice. “Yule” comes from the pagan winter festival Jol and “tide” is Old English for “time.”

Evergreens were the one plant that endured through the brutal Northern European winters, and were proof that life could persist during those dark times. (Literally dark - no daylight during winter solstice!) So the ancient pagans celebrated them during their winter solstice festivals.

Early pagans from Scandinavia to Germany to the British Isles were the original DIY winter holiday evergreen decorators!

This year perhaps I’m feeling my Celtic roots because my holiday Christmas decorating is all about green, inside and out. There’s nary a red poinsettia or decoration in sight.

Actually I think it has more to do with the feelings of calm and serenity that green evokes. I don’t need to re-iterate the challenges of this year and last, so some “serenity now!” (bonus points if you get that one) is in order.

[Read more about where some of our Christmas traditions come from.]

Holiday decorating with holly and mistletoe like we see in this vintage Christmas postcard originated in pagan winter solstice festivals where evergreens were celebrated for their ability to survive winter. Image | Graphics Fairy

Holiday decorating with holly and mistletoe like we see in this vintage Christmas postcard originated in pagan winter solstice festivals where evergreens were celebrated for their ability to survive winter. Image | Graphics Fairy

 

Ready to give your front door and porch a natural makeover? I wasn’t sure when I started, but it turned out to be an easy and fun approach to holiday decorating that brings festive and welcoming Yuletide cheer to your home.

Happy Holidays To All!

 
 
 
 
 
 
DIY, Home DecorTina Flint HuffmanholidayComment