How to Decorate for Christmas on a Budget
How to Decorate for Christmas on a Budget
This post specifically is for all of you procrastinators out there, like me, who haven’t even touched a Christmas decoration yet. Bonus points if you’re on a tight budget. Over the years, I’ve made an art out of decorating for Christmas on a budget. I mean, from college apartments to our first home at Fort Benning, I’ve had to take the Christmas decorations I already had and adapt them to be used in new spaces while adding in a few key pieces here and there. I used to not want to put in the effort of decorating a tree, let alone an entire household, because I knew it would cost money we didn’t have and the holiday season is fleeting. If you’ve followed our house decorating journey, you know I’m a recovering it-needs-to-be-done-right-nower. The holiday season, with all of the house tours and gift guides and sales can make us quickly lose site over what’s really important this time of year. As I’ve gotten older I’ve come to realize that less really is more when it comes to decorating. If you have the money and time and energy to go all out, that’s great! But if you’re like me and can’t really afford to sink a ton of money into decorating for each and every holiday, then this post is for you! That’s why I put together this article with all of my top tips for decorating your house for Christmas on a budget. These holiday decorating tips are the very ones I use myself!
May this post help you get into the Christmas decorating spirit while also keeping your budget in check!
Splurge on Items you use every year
Part of decorating on a budget is knowing where to splurge and where to save on decorations. One area where I highly suggest splurging is on your Christmas tree itself. While it may seem counter intuitive to pay more for something that’s only up for a few days a year it makes sense when you add up the cost of buying a new Christmas tree every year, especially if you’re buying a real tree. The tree that I purchased in 2013 survived five moves and made it until Christmas Eve of 2018 when it met its demise thanks to our cat, Scout. The Christmas tree is the anchor of your Christmas decorations so it makes sense to spend a little extra money on it. Oh, and did I mention that this tree is pre-lit which makes ALL the difference when you're decorating. Nobody has time for dealing with strings and strings of Christmas lights.
There's a pretty funny story behind why I splurged on this Christmas tree. It was my senior year of college so Christmas of 2013 and my roommate (shout out to Brittany if you're reading this) and I decided that we wanted to decorate the apartment for Christmas. The problem was that we had absolutely nothing to decorate with. Of course we knew we needed to start with a tree and thus we ended up going to our favorite place on Earth: Target. (Seriously we probably went to Target at least twice a week back then... well, nothing has changed for me TBH). Anyways, apparently everyone else had the same idea as us because when we got to the Christmas section they had NOTHING. No trees in sight. Except for this one which I ended up buying. This 6 foot tall Christmas tree that barely fit in our apartment... oh and it was $100. Which, some of you may not think that's a lot for a Christmas tree because I know there are definitely more expensive ones out there but to a broke college girl, that's a lot!
Another item I definitely splurged on is a tree skirt or collar. Unless some disaster happens to them, you don't need to replace a tree skirt every year so go ahead and invest in the one you really want that will last for Christmases to come! While I decided a tree collar would be better suited for our setup this year, the tree skirt I purchased in 2015 is still in perfect condition and will continue to be used for our Christmas decor, especially if we start adding multiple trees to the house!
Back to the story of decorating my first Christmas tree, we spent so much money on the tree itself that, being the broke college girls we were, we couldn't really afford to pay for anything to put ON the tree. We also had two cats and two dogs in the apartment and you can imagine that we weren't really willing to shell a bunch of money on decorations that were most likely going to get broken at some point. So we decided to head to the local dollar store, which I think was a Dollar Tree, and check out their Christmas selection which leads us to our next tip:
Check out your local Dollar Store
My second and probably biggest piece of advice for decorating for Christmas on a budget is to never count out the Dollar Store. The Dollar Store is full of items that most people would typically overlook because, well, they're a dollar, but you can really find some inexpensive but great additions to your Christmas decor if you're willing to do a little bit of searching. One of my favorite content creators has an entire DIY video about creating Christmas decor from items at The Dollar Tree!
Shop Second Hand
If you’re a regular around the Made in Mom Jeans blog or even just my Instagram then you already know that most of the items I’ve added to our Christmas decor for this year have come from local thrift stores. I even found a beautiful vintage nativity scene, one of the items on my list to buy this year, for $8. Around the holiday season, most thrift stores hold their Christmas decor to be put out during this time. Seriously, the Goodwill I visited in last week’s Thrift With Me Friday video on IGTV was filled with Christmas decor! Shopping second hand is a great way to find one-of-a-kind Christmas decor while keeping your wallet happy. You’ll even help out the environment, which is always a great bonus!
Choose a simple theme
You can go with a new Christmas theme every year if you want to but that honestly seems more stressful and more money than it's worth. And then you look back five years later and wonder how you got so many boxes filled with Christmas decor sitting in the basement that you now have to dig through every year before finding what you want (yes, I'm speaking from my childhood experience). Not only will choosing a theme to stick to save you money in the long run but it will also be easier for you to plan out your decorations and the new items you need to buy or would like to add in every year. There are SO many Christmas decorations out there that it can easily become overwhelming when you're trying to decide what to buy but sticking to a theme will definitely help you out!
Build off of your everyday decor
Trying to build all of our holiday decorations around our current decor is what I’m focusing on this year and moving forward in our house decorating journey. By building off the color pallete and design style you already have, you’ll be more able to create a cohesive design while also avoiding changing up your style every year for the holiday season. Another thing that goes hand in hand with the idea of building off of your everyday style is buying pieces you love. It can be so easy with all of the deals and all of the cute different decor pieces to easily get overwhelmed and overspend. But really being intentional with your purchases and buying pieces you’ll be excited to pull out and use every year is a great way to keep your budget in check.
Buy Christmas decor after Christmas
You can buy all kinds of items at a great discount after Christmas and I would suggest thinking about those items that would typically be a splurge and making a plan to try and snag them after the holidays. A few years ago, I actually picked up one of my favorite purchases ever after Christmas. Justin and I were in Alaska visiting his family and we had just gotten engaged about a little over a month prior to this. I had been eyeing these knit initial stockings from Target over the entire season but wasn't really willing to pay the money for them (and I could never find each of our initials in matching ones). Low and behold, when we went to Target while in Alaska to get our first wedding registry started I found these babies on sale for more than 50% off their original price and just knew that I HAD to have them. I've been waiting all year to put them up and it's definitely been worth the wait. We were even able to pick up one for Jasper last year and I’ve already seen them out again this year so these stockings are really easy to grab each year during the post-holiday sales but are also a great idea to splurge on.