This is our third Christmas in England (read about last Christmas here) and third year we have gone with my Tiffany’s inspired Christmas tree. I had used this once before back when we were living in Hawaii. Sadly as a person of high mobility I know the experience of losing things through out the years as you move. We lost a whole box of our Christmas decorations somewhere from Hawaii to England. So much of what I have on the tree we have acquired since living in the UK. With a smaller budget and less Christmas holiday resources (lets be honest the USA really goes big when it comes to any holiday) I have been able to keep up the theme.
Aside from some of the token blue ornaments that did arrive I also had a few of the plastic diamonds that I had bought at a chain craft store in the US. It originally was a huge tub of these plastic clear diamonds in three different sizes with holes perfect for ornament hooks. I also had my Tiffany’s boxes, pouches, and bags that I have also graced my tree with this year. For hanging up the original boxes I pierced the box with a hand sewing needle twice and then threaded through a piece of white thread to make a loop from which I could hang it like an ornament. The two inch wide ribbon you see on the top of the tree has wire on either side which makes it easy to curl. I suggest either using the roll of wrapping paper or for a looser curl a one pint size beer can. The mask at the top was a prop I had used on a photo shoot in Hawaii which I have used to put a little bit of my years growing up in Italia into our holiday.
We have bought the rest of our ornaments at various pound shops (think dollar store). Pound shops are great places to find Christmas decorations! We have three different types of garlands on our tree and I found a matching tinsel garland this year which is across our tree on our mirror. The big foam snowflakes, the silver ornaments, the silver bell ornaments, and the silver gift tags (yes they work great as ornaments) also came from the pound shop.
Get Creative! I wanted to really punch the theme so I found those little white boxes in a wedding section of the store that you would use for reception gifts for guests. I put them together, taped them up, covered them in the blue coloured tissue paper, and added white ribbon to get little Tiffanys inspired boxes for the tree. I put in the ornament hook at the corner of the box so that it hangs at an appealing angle on the tree.
We also have a small (near enough to) three foot tall tree. It was our main tree our first year here in England before a client at the salon gave me her big tree before moving out of the country. The boys are using this one as their ‘free for all’ decorating. I grew up with a mum who did similar. We had a main tree that was decorated to a colour scheme and a smaller one we could decorate with all the other ornaments you collect through the years as a child. It is a beloved tradition we have carried on with our family and my boys had fun decorating their tree last night. It included our egg blown ornaments we made this week as a family as seen on Amanda’s blog in Making Your Own Christmas Egg Ornaments. I decorate mine with a map on the bottom half (a keepsake from Wales) and a night sky on top. The boys and my husband use tissue paper to collage their eggs with glue and I ended up joining in and making one more too. It is a fun idea for making DIY ornaments at home.
This year my kids opted to not use the star or angel on the top but our golden snitch ornament that we made with my sister, their Zia Zoe, last Christmas. Want your own Harry Potter Snitch for your tree? Find an ornament in a gold shade and grab some paper, scissors, and glue. I picked up our ornament for not very much at a charity shop and had my sister make the wings for the boys. It is our favourite (non blue/silver) ornament for sure! Anyone else have a Harry Potter inspired ornament on their tree? I would love to hear about it!
Q: If you put up a tree this year, what was your theme if you had one? Or tell me what your tree looks like!
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Looking for Travel Tuesday? As it is Christmas Eve we have taken a week off to celebrate with family. Check back next week on New Years Eve for the next edition of #TravelTuesday!
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The demonstration was amazing. I only wish we could have made it there as part of the class. I did however get to buy panettone cases so I can try this at home.This was my first time having homemade panettone, having grown up eating the ones from the store for Christmas in Napoli, Italia. It was really soft and the most delicious panettone I have ever eaten. I cannot wait to make my own this year too! Thank you so much to Ottavia and to Yammo for hosting such an amazing afternoon!
