Article #30 Artistic Holiday Trees

With great enthusiasm, the close of Halloween prompts a trip to the storeroom to pull out the holiday decorations. It is easy to decorate a tree on a budget. Decisions, decisions!?

The Nature-Inspired Holiday Debacle

 I was living in a mostly glass condominium building overlooking Tampa Bay.  Inspired by the incredible view of greenery and sea life, a bright idea ensued to purchase a case of clear glass balls. Half were partially filled with birdseed. Big burlap ribbon natural bows were made and tied by green wire.  The balance of the case of glass balls was completed by placing a square piece of gold foil inside. The white lights twinkled as they bounced off the gold. Large soft white doves adorned the green branches, head to toe. The tree was a spectacular low-budget success.  The reason for the ideas’ success was the contrast of the sparkling gold foil against the natural birdseed and burlap. Just like in a beautiful canvas painting, strong well-appointed contrast creates interest.

 When the season ended.  I carefully packed away all the balls in a closet and forgot all about them. Six months later, during the hot summer months, I had to call the exterminator. They were stumped as to why my minimalistic contemporary apartment was filled with tiny little black beetle bugs.  The condominium had a strict no-guest rule, so I had to figure out how to ask the little guys to move out.  It took three visits from the exterminator to find the culprit. The weevils had used their six-month visit wisely, snacking on the delicious organic bird seed. They had created a village with generations of family and village neighbors on the top shelf in the closet. The moral of the story is to empty your balls thoroughly after the holiday.

Lesson learned. Knowledge is power. After this experience, when I returned from the market, I isolated all my grains, cereals, and pasta in sealed glass jars.  All the nuts went into glass jars in the refrigerator. After a couple of months, I inspected the jars to see if there were any unwanted living protein families, before using the grain for a meal. This has turned out to be good practice. To think it all started with holiday decorations. 

Blue Balls

Another great standby holiday tree idea is to first start with a favorite color.  Any color will work as a main feature, orange, purple, and pink are unique nontraditional colors that will be effective with the following tree idea.  Let’s use large blue balls. Next, choose a metal. Blue and silver go well together. The trick to success is to be generous with the quantity of decorations. Most of the blue balls go on the green tree branches. Save some for-table decorations.  The concept is like using fine art in a room.  You want to be intentional and careful with your focal points. Twinkling white string lights will add reflection. Lastly, hang transparent frosted or crystal-clear style ornaments to complement the blue. The ornaments usually have a touch of silver on the claps.  The important part is the vertical shape.  To save on cost, shop the many after-holiday sales the prior year. This way you can buy a large quantity to save.

Complementary Metal

 A simple but impactful idea for the suggested silver metal is aluminum foil. Save some shallow horizontal boxes with short sides.  Carefully wrap the entire box without wrinkles or bumps. Fill it with greenery, blue balls, and some smaller silver balls. If the box has sides that are higher than two inches, the silver will take attention away from the balls.  The contrast of size between the large blue and the smaller silver balls throughout the house will be minimalist and sophisticated. If you have a large, tall glass vase in your home, you can fill it with any extra blue and silver balls. Large jars will work as well.  Adding a strand of tiny sparkling battery-operated lights draws the eye. Just don’t add lights everywhere. You can sprinkle these containers through the home to pull the silver and blue together and make the holiday home cohesive. I hope these ideas have sparked some thought. Call and share your funny experiences with artful holiday decorations. I am always open for a chuckle.

The painting shared in this article is Sea of Gold, 48″ x 48″ is blue oil paint contrasted with gold leaf on a canvas. Size does matter.