Our exterior was seriously lacking the Christmas spirit that shines inside. I’ve been a little stumped as far as how I wanted to decorate outside.

Took a quick pic then made a loose game plan involving up to 15 window wreaths plus a wreath and garland around the front door. Sounded expensive.

BEFORE going shopping I had an epiphany to explore our natural resources. Hello, pine forest.

{in Florida my go to garland source was my magnolia tree}

Headed out to the pines with our large clippers.

Made a pile of my fresh loot then gathered floral wire, scissors and jute.

I made window sill swags in about 5 minutes. The bay window sills are 5 feet long. I trimmed clippings to about 3 feet then placed half facing left and half facing to the right. I overlapped the branches and wired them together with floral wire.

We ran wire under the screen to secure the swag to the window sill. That was a 2 person job.

I measured around the front door – both sides and across the top- then cut a 20 foot piece. I found the center and wired branches to the jute. I oriented them to the left of center and to the right wiring branches to the jute until I reached the ends.

Hung the garland to check length. I also made a wire loop over the light fixture to hang a layered mix of greens. Now we have a fresh green overload at the front entry.

Picked up a few spools of red ribbon at Walmart to break up all the green.

I used some around my urns and on the light fixture sprays but I can’t decide if I like it.

Subtracted the red ribbon under the lights for another picture. Not sure what I’ll end up with but in the big scheme of life this is not a biggie.

Added a bow to the fresh greens on the 2 bay window sills.

Adding all of this fresh greenery was completely free. I used our natural resources, ribbon from my stash plus $3.98 for the new spool. Not bad, huh? Totally worth the sappy fingers😁

I still need to track down wreaths for the windows and front door. Overall, I’m happy with today’s progress for the entry.

Happy holidays y’all~

Kristen