Growing up in Oregon, our house was surrounded by towering pine trees. Every year we would trek to the forest (or a local farm), to cut down our Christmas tree. Since moving to California, I've started a collection of small faux trees. I don't really know how it started but I devised a vision of building my own Christmas tree forest. I'm now up to 4 trees, green, blue, silver and the new one this year is white. It's a diverse little family of trees and I adore them. Today I'm going to show you how I decorated my little neon tree one layer at a time. It really helped ensure that everything was spread out evenly and looked balanced.
I started out by making a tree skirt out of white felt, which is essentially a circle skirt for your tree. All you do is determine the radius of the skirt you want to make. Draw a circle on your fabric and cut it out. Mark the center of the circle and cut a straight line from one edge to the center. Mark a second small circle in the center for you tree trunk. For a faux tree like mine, the center hole does not need to be large, about 3 inches in diameter. If you want more tree skirt inspiration, check out this great tutorial on A Beautiful Mess.
To dress up my tree skirt, I stitched pink bias binding around the raw edges. I used this machine foot to attach the binding. It's much faster than going the traditional route. I only ran into trouble at the corners which are a little wonky but because they're in the back, I just left them imperfect. Next, I stitched a loop trim an inch or so from the edge. I didn't pin it down or mark where it should go. I just stitched it down and trimmed. (Obviously I was feeling anxious to finish the skirt and get on to the decorating!) I have yards and yards of this trim that I bought for just a few dollars so I used another piece of the loop trim to create a garland and hung up some pink balls I found at the dollar store.
Now for the fun part! The ornaments! I found some fun hot pink balls at the dollar store and they went on first.
Next, I made beaded tassel ornaments (tutorial here) using neon acrylic yarns and some bright geometric beads. Then I made a few yarn pom poms and threw those on the tree too.
Instead of a traditional topper, I stuck a few beads right on the top branch of the tree. Too many beads made it tip over a bit but three was just the right amount. This tree lives in my den/tv/sewing room and I really love it. It's bright and cheerful with a snowy vibe. It looks so pretty when lit up and makes the room feel very cozy. Have you made any new ornaments this year? Have you ever gone crazy for Christmas trees like I have?
