Ultimate Guide to Christmas Tree Decorating: From Ribbon to Toppers, and Everything in Between! (Part 2)

Thanks for joining us in part two of the ultimate guide to Christmas tree decorating. If you haven’t already, be sure to check out part one for what you need to know on the essentials, like building your holiday theme.

Let’s dive into the decorations that will turn your tree into a memory-making, Christmas cheer spreading machine!

Floral Sprays & Picks - Nailing that Natural Look

These decorations add attractive sparks to any Christmas tree. Floral sprays and picks offer a multitude of moods for enhancing your tree’s theme. And they make it easy to add groupings of décor to your tree quickly and efficiently.

Sprays and picks can grace your tree with the natural appearance of red berries, soft ss sneedles, and exquisite flowers. They can bring vibrancy in brilliant hues of silver and gold. And they can even impress in the forms of sweet-looking candies and familiar Christmas items.

Like ribbon, picks and sprays make great fillers in the spots around your lights and ornaments. As with any Christmas tree decorations, the success of implementing sprays and picks into your tree depends on how well they match with your theme. Sprays and picks that complement each other are perfect for placing on your tree in clusters, or even for sprucing up the look around your tree topper.

Ornaments - The Key to Classic Christmas Decorating

Ornaments offer boundless opportunity for Christmas tree decorating. There are so many shapes and styles of ornaments, from traditional Christmas balls to pretty snowflakes, and even from decorations based on popular media like Star Wars to sets styled after favorite sports teams. And of course, they can be a lot of fun to put with your family.

Let’s explore some sssof the best kinds of ornaments for your tree, and then discuss techniques for getting the most out of them.

Christmas Globes

Christmas globe ornaments are the most iconic of Christmas ornaments, and they stand with Christmas lights themselves as the ultimate in modern Christmas tree decorating tradition. Our Christmas globes come in shiny, matte, and glittered finishes. But no matter the finish, round Christmas ornaments practically exude a warm, comforting Christmas feel that helps to explain how they’ve remained a decorating favorite for all these years.

Round ornament globes are also available in various themes and designs based on popular media such as movies, video games, and sports teams.

Finials

You’ve likely seen this shape at the end of curtain rods, which helps secure the curtain against the end of the rod. Finials also adorn peaks of towers and other tall structures. You can bring this tasteful ornamentation that draws from interesting architectural styles to your Christmas tree with finial ornaments.

Figurines

These little wonders help your tree tell a story about its theme, and the charm that it brings to your overall Christmas decorating arrangement. Will your Christmas tree decorating strike a traditional tone with the vigilant nutcracker? Or will you evoke scenes of winter wonderlands through figurines of reindeer and snowmen?

Homemade

Homemade decorations are particularly special in Christmas tree decorating because they come from the heart. Creating them gives you and the family a tender time to enjoy being together during the holiday season. And seeing those adorable, homemade decorations will always remind of your loved ones.

You can make any ornament you can think of—painted globes, food-based decorations, embroidered hoops, engraved acrylics, felt animals, etc. You name it, you can dive right into the beautifully fun craft of making your own ornaments.

Decorating with Ornaments

Start with the largest ornaments near the bottom of the tree, putting up smaller ornaments as you ascend. Ornaments are best placed on the tree later in the Christmas tree decorating process so that you don’t have to navigate the more cumbersome decorations, like ribbon and lights, around such delicate decorations.

Add depth to your Christmas tree decorating by using ornaments that contain one to two colors from your theme (we call these “blender” ornaments). Or try using one color for your ornaments in several shades (i.e., forest green and mint green).

For styling your ornaments, you have a few major considerations:

• Use of size
• Ornament lengths
• Finishes

Use of Size: Uniformity or variety?

Uniform ornament sizing makes the most sense when using ornament sets. Similar or like-sized ornaments also take the work out of arranging ornaments of differing sizes, allowing for more focus on your other decorations such as ribbon and picks.

On the other hand, variety in ornament sizing can be used to create attractive effects. We recommend using a limited number of sizes so that your tree’s ornamentation doesn’t look all over the place.

Ornament Lengths

Ornaments and ornament-like objects with long “vertical drops” create excitement and intrigue. Finial ornaments and bead strings are great for adding such impact that can spice up your tree’s presentation.

Finishes

An ornament’s finish imparts a sense of texture, which influences the overall impression of feel in your Christmas tree’s decorative arrangement. The most popular finishes for Christmas ornaments are matte, shiny, and glitter, which are the three finishes that our Christmas ornaments come in. On a general note regarding glitter: better quality decorations will have better glitter and glue, leaving you with less of a mess.

And rather than using hooks, which can be quite sharp, how about choosing small ribbons to hang your ornaments with? It’s a prettier and safer option!

Garland — The Christmas Spirit Wrapped around Your Tree

A wonderful alternative to ribbon, garland is an opportunity for the decorator who wants to experiment with color and material. Although not as common on Christmas trees these days, garland might be just the decoration to give your tree a look that stands out from the rest.

Christmas color garland wraps your tree in spirited sparkle for some exciting contrast, especially on classic green trees. You can also use Christmas color garland on a colorful Christmas tree to bolster the palette. Beaded garland is a type of garland that’s picking up in popularity for home decor, and can be used to help show your up-to-date taste in Christmas tree decorating.

Tree Toppers - Topping Off Your Decorating Masterpiece

The crowning piece to any tree is the topper. A brilliant topper triumphantly commands attention up toward the heavens, while an elegant adornment finishes out a tree that’s decorated with consistency in mind.

The top toppers (couldn’t resist the pun) are stars and angels. Five point, Moravian, and 3D dimensional stars are a few styles of stars that you can use to proclaim the glory of Christmas on your tree. Angels as toppers are available in a variety of lighthearted creative appearances or striking artistic portrayals.

Looking for a different way to top off your tree? Try a bow, finial, or feathers. These toppers bring unique flair to your tree, while offering a sense of texture.

And Most Importantly…

Have fun and spread the Christmas cheer! Enjoy the special holiday moments of Christmas tree decorating with family. Throw on your favorite Christmas tunes, put out plates of holiday treats, and let the kids put up the decorations they love. The memories you make while decorating your tree can last a lifetime.

That wraps up our ultimate guide on Christmas tree decorating! If you have any questions on what we covered or something else in the world of Christmas decorating, don’t hesitate to reach out. We’re here for you at our email, info@christmasdesigners.com, or our phone line, 1-800-391-5280. Reach out today and have your decorating matter squared away.