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Decorate Your House Without Buying Anything: Christmas Edition

This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Nottingham chapter.

We all know how expensive and resource-heavy Christmas is. No matter how festive you are feeling and how many Christmas presents you’ve bought, your house looks exactly the same as it has done for the last two months, quite disheartening when you think about it. So don’t! If I can’t make it with what is in my student house right now, it isn’t on this list. Whack on the kettle, your Christmas music and your arts-and-crafts-hat and lets have some festive fun!

Bottle Cap Snowmen!

You’re going to need:

Lots of bottle caps sorted into threes

Tipex

Ribbon/string/dental floss

Pens

Tape

Directions:

●     Tape the ribbon (or ribbon substitute) to the backs of three lined up bottle caps.

●     Turn the caps over and tipex them white

●     Draw Snowmen features on them

 

 

Stencil-ly Christmas Fun!

You’re going to need:

Stencil (You can just print one and then cut it out)

Light coloured paper/ that ruined white pillowcase

Glitter/paint/nail varnish/that £3.99 red wine from Co-op that you were going to keep for pre-drinks

Directions:

●     Select a highly seasonal stencil

●     Use stencil to stick lots of anything to anything else and VOILA Christmas!

●     A good stag stencil to get you started can be found by following the link

Winter Wine Bottles!

You’re going to need:

Wine/beer/nicely shaped glass bottles

Things to decorate with

e.g. tipex, pens, glue, paper, glitter, old makeup, whatever you have to hand.

Directions:

●     Clean and dry your wine bottles.

●     Gratuitously decorate your wine bottles.

●     Decorate some more.

●     That’s better.

●     Tip: If you have glitter you can make anything festive

 

Cotton ball snowfall!

You’re going to need:

Dental floss or thread

Cotton balls (or paper snowflakes)

A needle

Directions:

●     Make your cotton balls a few different sizes by pulling them into two or three pieces and rolling each piece in your hand to smooth it out.

●     Carefully sew or tie your cotton balls or snowflakes together. Don’t forget to tie a knot at the end so they stay together.

 

Snowman Milk Cartons!

You’re going to need:

Milk cartons (made of white plastic)

A printer

Tape/glue

Directions:

●     Clean and dry your milk cartons

●     Print off funny faces, scarves, hats and carrot noses for your snow carton men

●     Stick them on, simples!

 

Giant ice marbles!

You’re going to need:

Food colouring

Balloons (Left over from my birthday party)

REALLY cold weather or a Freezer, either one.

Directions:

●     Fill the balloons with water

●     Put some food colouring in each, mixing well before tying closed.

●     Leave outside to freeze (or if you have lots of space in your freezer that’ll do too)

 

Cardboard Reindeer Head

You’re going to need:

Cardboard (from the recycling that I still haven’t taken out…)

Pen

Scissors

Something to decorate it with (Wrapping paper, tinsel, glitter etc)

Follow the instructions in the link to put your reindeer together!

 

Edited by Caroline Chan

Image Sources:

http://tvatemywardrobe.com/2013/12/11/festive-rewind-parks-and-recreation-citizen-knope/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/318629742359880126/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/324962929337516615/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/503699539548421743/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/30962316162365539/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/160792649169641881/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/264586546829249594/

 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/481955597594349269/

 

I'm a fourth year at the University of Nottingham and I never want to leave. I blog about easy ways to make a difference in our world and to our community and I spend most of my life online. When the wifi is down though I love to bake, play with dogs, go exploring, maybe do some coursework and (pretend that I can) sing and dance.
Harriet Dunlea is Campus Correspondent and Co-Editor in Chief of Her Campus Nottingham. She is a final year English student at the University of Nottingham. Her passion for student journalism derives from her too-nosey-for-her-own-good nature.