How To Decorate A Christmas Tree On A Budget

I feel like Christmas quite often sneaks up on us, and can often be far more expensive than we planned it to be. So today, with the help of The Warehouse, we thought we'd share our tips on how to decorate a Christmas tree on a budget.The first stop is obviously purchasing the tree itself. We are huge fans of real Christmas trees, but considering they're a one time use thing - it can be cheaper to buy an artificial tree that you can reuse year after year. Artificial trees have come a long way since I was a kid and they actually look pretty decent these days. There's a huge range at The Warehouse, and the one we settled on was the Wonderland Vienna Tree in Black (RRP: $80.00 NZD). It's 180cm tall, and has 694 tips making it look quite nice and bushy.



Next it's time to decide on a colour theme. We decided to go for gold, white and black - and lucky for us, there were a lot of decorations to choose from. Here's what we settled on:

• Wonderland Bauble Hollow Glitter White 6cm 6 Pack - RRP: $8.00 NZD


• Tinsel Town Star Tree Topper - RRP: $2.00 NZD


• Tinsel Town Baubles 6cm 10 Assorted - RRP: $2.50 NZD 


• Wonderland Tree Decoration Glitter Reindeer Head - RRP: $3.00 NZD

• Wonderland 3 Pack of Baubles - Black and Gold - RRP: $7.00 NZD


• Wonderland White & Gold Starts 6 Pack - RRP: $8.00 NZD


• Wonderland Glitter White Stars 6 Pack - RRP: $4.00 NZD


• Wonderland Gold Reindeer 2 Pack - RRP: $2.00 NZD


• Miscellaneous Tree Decorations - RRP: $3.00 NZD each

Lights were another important choice, and after a lot of thought we decided to go for warm white LED lights. The ones we settled on were all from the Wonderland range. The main set we picked up to cover most of the tree were the Wonderland Plug In LED Twister Light 280 Piece (RRP: $45.00 NZD). They're so cool! They have several different light modes, so you can make them flicker, fade out etc. Then for something a bit different, we grabbed a pack of the Wonderland Pinecone lights (RRP: $12.00 NZD). Having 2 sets of lights makes everything a bit more interesting!



We didn't stop there. To go alongside our tree, we grabbed the very cool Wonderland Plug In LED Standing Reindeer (RRP: $60.00 NZD). It's quite expensive, but at the time they had 30% off the Wonderland range of lights so we were able to fit it within our budget. So glad we did, as it really does add more dimension to our little Christmas area.

As well as using shop bought decorations, we decided to add our own touch with some simple DIYs.

DIY Fill Your Own Baubles

You'll need:

• Wonderland Baubles - Clear Fill Your Own 4 pack  - RRP: $5.00 NZD


• Twine


• Miscellaneous items to put inside your baubles (glitter, feathers, tinsel etc)

We're all about the easy DIYs here - especially when sticking to a budget, so we kept this one nice and simple. We filled one with about a metre long length of tinsel ribbon; one with black and white feathers; one with white glitter and white glitter pom poms and the last one with tiny little seashells. Once on the tree, they really look pretty awesome!

DIY Seashell Decorations

You'll need:

• Gold paint, or spray paint


• Seashells


• Twine

This is nothing new, and is something we've actually done quite a few times over the years - painting seashells gold! Probably one of the easiest DIYs you could do, but also one of the best as they always turn out great. We used a hot glue gun to attach our twine to hang on the tree. BOOM.

DIY Christmas Tree Ornaments

You'll need:

• Little Hands Styrofoam Small Cones 5.5cm x 10cm 6 Pack - RRP: $3.00 NZD


• Twine


• Tinsel ribbon


• Hot glue gun

There are endless options here; you could cover these styrofoam cones in sequins, glitter or even paint them. We decided to wrap twine and tinsel ribbon around them. If you prefer, you can attach more twine so you can hang them from the tree.



Another thing we've done is write "Merry Christmas" in different languages on the Wonderland Gift Tags (RRP: $4.00 NZD) and hang them on the tree as decorations. Couldn't get any easier than that!

When it came to decorating a Christmas tree on a budget, we set our limit at $200.00 NZD - which I'm happy to say we stuck to, thanks to the great specials that were on when we went shopping. That is my number 1 tip for decorating a Christmas tree on a budget - keep an eye out for specials! The closer we get to Christmas, the better the sales seem to be (for the decorations at least!)



Side note: We also like to purchase 1 "luxury" decoration each year. This year it was this gorgeous little owl from Rapt in Newmarket. Isn't it just adorable?!

Are you putting up a Christmas tree this year? If you want, show us a photo in the comments below! We'd love to see it!

Thanks for viewing!
oxo

*Thanks to The Warehouse for making this post possible