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You are visiting: Home » Decorating/DIY » Create Your Decor » Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

by Lindsay Ballard on December 5, 2014 7 Comments

I’m not a huge fan of over the top Christmas decorating. At least in my own home, it’s just not practical. Between all of the school activities around the holidays, gift wrapping and just general hustle and bustle of daily life, I just never find the time (or the need) to cover every square inch of my home in garlands and glitter.  And honestly, if I’m going to put a lot of work into decorations, they better be something that I can enjoy year around.

Some years I decorate more than others (like last year compared to this year), but I always make it a point to have a good looking Christmas tree. Just like with the rest of my holiday decorations, I don’t think a Christmas tree needs to have tons of fluff. Instead, I like to follow a simple recipe, and my tree always ends up looking nice.

This year, I helped a dear friend get her tree trimmed, and I detailed the steps below. I wanted the tree to look like her, and she wanted to make sure that it had some of my style elements.  The end result is fun!

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

1.  Start by setting your tree up and string it with lights (if it is real or isn’t pre-lit).  For Olivia’s house, we were working with a pre-lit, artificial tree (we were sent an Oh Christmas Tree from Treetopia).  It was really easy to set up straight out of the box.  Each of the three sections is labeled, and you literally just stick them together.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

Once the sections were put into place and we fluffed the branches out to the desired fullness, we plugged each section’s lights together and plugged them into the wall outlet.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree
It’s lovely already!

You can choose clear or multi-colored lights.  I know that a clear-lit tree is very on trend right now, but I’ve always been a big fan of multi-colored lights.  Surprised?  No, I didn’t think so.  When stringing a live tree or one that’s not pre-lit, I start from the bottom and work my way up, making sure the light strands are equally spaced as they spiral around the tree.

2.  Add some garland.  I don’t always add garland to my Christmas trees, but I do like the way it looks.  I do prefer my garland to be on the thin side instead of extremely wide – that way, it doesn’t hide the ornaments.

Olivia and I found this spiky, icicle garland and thought it would be a fun touch to her tree.  We started working from the top and wound our way down the tree.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

3.  Add background ornaments.  At this point, I like to add large ornaments with little detail deep into the branches of the tree.  It’s a great place for the large ball ornaments that come in solid colors.  For Olivia’s tree, I added large red and silver balls.  Then, I added some slightly smaller ones in red, silver and black.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

The purpose of these ornaments is to fill in the branches and blend into the background.  You don’t really want huge ornaments like this to take center stage, so I don’t put them as forward as the special ornaments.

4.  Add large speciality ornaments.   Olivia and I found several large ornaments that she really liked, so this was the time to add some of those.  There are several large poinsettias and some big stars that we added to the tree.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

5.  Add medium ornaments.  The next thing I added was some medium sized ornaments that we picked up.  We wanted to keep this particular tree in a red, black and silver theme, so the ornaments we added fit into those parameters.  There are little gift boxes, snowflakes and medium balls.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

6.  Add themed ornaments.  If you have a theme for your tree, now is the time to add those ornaments.  Olivia’s tree has a penguin theme, so we added her penguin ornaments throughout the tree.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

7.  Add other special ornaments.  At this time, you can add in the rest of the special ornaments that you really want on your tree.  Olivia spent some time in England, so we added some of her ornaments from that time, along with some others that she has collected over the years.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

8.  Add tree topper.  Tree toppers come in many shapes, sizes and styles.  We chose a sparkly silver angel for the top of Olivia’s tree.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

9.  Add tree skirt or base decoration.  There are a lot of ways to cover the metal tree base, but I’m a sucker for tree skirts.  We found this simple one at a local store and both loved it.

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

I should have ironed it, but I try to avoid ironing at all costs.

10.  Step back and enjoy!

Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree

I am one of those people who really thinks that all Christmas trees are beautiful, so this recipe just helps me to get everything on the tree in the right order so that it can be seen.  This tree has a much different look than the Treetopia tree I put together last year (and will put up again in my own home), but they both followed the same formula.

Do you decorate your tree in a certain order every year?  Or do you put on whatever you pull out of the ornament box first?

This post is sponsored by Treetopia.  They sent me the beautiful tree for review, but all opinions are my own.

About Lindsay Ballard

Lindsay Ballard is a former college mascot turned political geek turned roller derby playing, DIY fanatic.

Lindsay chronicles her projects, design ideas, and lifestyle tips here at Makely, where she shares tutorials and inspiration. Her DIY designs are bold and graphic, while her spirit is fun and full of color.

Lindsay lives outside of Austin, Texas with her husband (Tom), children (Zack and Emma), and dogs (Duke and Jill). She plays roller derby for the Rockin' City Rollergirls out of Round Rock, Texas.

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Comments

  1. Karin Meenan says

    December 5, 2014 at 4:47 pm

    We have a prelit artificial tree. Ours changes slowly from white to colored lights. I always start with ribbon/garland. This year we did ribbon. Then I put up the star at the top and put up the small ornaments while I am up there. Next the larger ornaments that need to fill in spaces. Then the rest of my ornaments. I have a teddy bear themed tree. Once the tree is done, stockings go up as does a garland on my stairs and we are done!

    Reply
  2. savita says

    December 6, 2014 at 12:27 am

    It is beautiful. Christ mas is about the birth of Jesus. I would have liked to see him depicted somewhere along the line.
    May be nearer the base.
    Happy holidays.
    Nulkar

    Reply
  3. Heather W says

    December 7, 2014 at 7:23 pm

    Next year, I’ll let you put mine up 🙂

    Reply
  4. aileen ann rawlings says

    December 7, 2014 at 8:59 pm

    to be honest i iwas in a hurry the this time but i had to look at everything on your first page. your taste style your genious ideas and home master piece pieces. WOW, BRAVO. definetly awwed and delighted that i found this great company to help inspire my creative juices to flow…. Thanks for sharing all these things with us

    sincerely

    , Aileen A. Rawlings

    Reply
  5. Andtrea says

    December 12, 2014 at 8:45 pm

    Very pretty. Looks like a mall Christmas tree:).

    Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Recipe for a Well Trimmed Christmas Tree | The Tressle Blog | The Official Blog for Tressle.com says:
    December 5, 2014 at 11:51 am

    […] I’m not a huge fan of over the top Christmas decorating. At least in my own home, it’s just not practical. Between all of the school activities around the holidays, gift wrapping and just general hustle and bustle of daily life, I just never find the time (or the need) to cover every square inch of my home in garlands and glitter.  And honestly, if I’m going to put a lot of work into decorations, they better be something that I can enjoy year around… Read On » […]

    Reply
  2. The Bloggers of Treetopia Design Council 2014 says:
    October 22, 2019 at 12:16 am

    […] Lindsay Ballard of Makely Home […]

    Reply

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About Makely

Lindsay Ballard is a former college mascot turned political geek turned roller derby playing, DIY fanatic.

Lindsay chronicles her projects, design ideas, and lifestyle tips here at Makely, where she shares tutorials and inspiration. Her DIY designs are bold and graphic, while her spirit is fun and full of color.

Lindsay lives outside of Austin, Texas with her husband (Tom), children (Zack and Emma), and dogs (Duke and Jill). She plays roller derby for the Rockin' City Rollergirls out of Round Rock, Texas.


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