Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Inspiration

Get festive with these houseplant “holidadecoration” ideas

Give your indoor jungle a jolly makeover this Christmas

Stacey Nguyen
By

Having a holly jolly Christmas can mean livening up your houseplants to help them get into the holiday spirit as well! As you decorate for the holidays, don’t forget your plants. For tips on how to make your plants festive for Christmas, we’ve come up with fun ways to extend the yuletide cheer to your favorite plants (that aren’t Christmas trees).

Monstera plant with lights

Add ornaments and lights to your houseplants

Here’s a simple holiday plant idea: Furnish your houseplants with ornaments, tinsel, and string lights. If you’re doing this in lieu of a Christmas tree, it’ll very likely be much cheaper than furnishing a 6-foot-tall tree, as you can buy most of the mini decorations at your local dollar store! Money trees, corn plants, and rubber trees are just a few houseplants with strong central stems that can handle minor weight from lights and ornaments. If you want to avoid placing anything onto your plants, create holiday stakes with cut-out Santas, snowflakes, ornaments, and more.

Actual tree plants, such as lemon cyprus, also work perfectly since they look like mini Christmas trees. They’re usually around 3 feet tall, so they’ll give you that Christmas feel without breaking your budget or burdening you with an extensive cleanup after the holidays.

Related
Christmas mug of polar bear in scarf

Use decorative mugs as planters

Along with bells, whistles, and ornaments, the holiday season also usually comes with new mugs in stores for everyone who wants to infuse festive cheer in a cup. If you have a holiday mug that you’re not getting much use out of, or one with minor cracks, upcycle it as a planter. You can drill a hole directly into your mug, but using it as a cover pot is definitely easier — a large one can easily accommodate a 2 or 3-inch nursery planter.

Ribbon on houseplant

Wrap ribbons around your plants

It really doesn’t get any easier than wrapping ribbons around your planters or branches for easy houseplant holiday decorations. For your ribbon, choose colors such as red, green, silver, and gold to give your plant Christmas vibes. Of course, holiday-specific and tartan patterns also work beautifully. For an even more low-maintenance project, stick a shiny adhesive bow onto your planter — you’ll likely have these around for wrapping presents, anyway! Another fun tip: Cover your planter in actual wrapping paper, then place an adhesive bow onto it.

Christmas skirt

Add Christmas skirts to your planters

If you have a plant sitting in a pot that’s at least 12 inches, you can definitely place a Christmas skirt beneath it to get that holiday vibe. Velvety, embroidered skirts are easy to source during the holidays in any home goods store or online. If you want to create one that’s more custom to the planter that you have, you can also get crafty. Pick out a fabric to your liking (burgundy and white make for classic Christmas skirts), cut and seam along the outside, then iron on holiday-themed embroidered patches.

Pothos vines

Place trailing plants on your mantle

Alongside your poinsettias and paperwhites, place a trailing plant on your mantle. Plants such as ivy, pothos, and philodendron can add a cozy, rustic feel to any space. They look especially inviting at the base of candle holders (just keep them away from flames!). You can attach ornaments to stems and nodes for a festive look as well — just make sure that your planter is heavy enough or securely attached to the mantle so that it doesn’t tip over.

Terrarium ornament

Make terrarium ornaments

Why not furnish your Christmas tree with even more plants? Grab sets of plastic or glass terrarium ornaments online or from a local craft store come the holidays. You can stick in an air plant to keep things simple. Alternatively, you can go all out with a soil base and mini plant cuttings. If space allows, add mini ornaments, gnomes, and other holiday-themed tchotchkes as well.

A person holding a bowl of air plants

Mount your air plants onto a wreath

Air plants are extremely easy to care for in addition to coming in interesting shapes and colors for a vibrant wreath setup. Secure these low-maintenance beauties to a plain wreath with floral wire and add creative touches with ornaments, fake holly, pine cones, and more. Every so often, spritz your air plants as you would if they weren’t on the wreath.

While houseplants can feel like separate entities from your Christmas decorations, they don’t have to be. It’s easy to incorporate holiday cheer into your home with plants. In some cases, you can skip the tree altogether if you don’t have the space — toss the tinsel, lights, and ornaments onto your favorite houseplant to ring in the holidays!

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
7 simple steps to starting your own beautiful container garden this spring
Stacey Nguyen
By Stacey Nguyen
May 28, 2022
Purple flowers in container in front of house

Even if you have space limits, starting a garden is still within reach. A small yard, balcony, or patio can still be a productive spot for a container garden. In addition to accommodating small spaces, container gardens are also low maintenance and easy to start, as finding planters is a much more straightforward process than building a garden bed. Plus, you can move your plants indoors or into the shade as needed. Here’s everything you need to know about how to start container gardening.

1. Determine which plants to grow
First and foremost, you want to determine what plants you’ll actually be growing. Most vegetables are annuals, but look up your plant hardiness zone, or climate zone, to see if your area has any perennial veggies. Remember, containers offer your plants and their roots limited growing space, so choose plants that can tolerate some space constraints. Veggies that do particularly well in containers include lettuce, peppers, tomatoes, chard, spinach, and beans. 
2. Find containers for your plants
Consider how deep your plant roots run. Plants with longer roots appreciate deeper planters, whereas plants with shallow roots should be in short containers to prevent root rot. You also want to keep in mind container material. Plastic is durable and easy to clean, but it tends to hold on to water longer. On the other hand, terracotta is forgiving if you overwater, but cracking and salt buildup may be issues. And then there's concrete, which is durable but also quite heavy. Other than conventional planters, you can also look into tubs, kitchenware, and miscellaneous boxes that you can upcycle for gardening purposes.

Read more
Create a picturesque springtime garden with these 4 bamboo garden ideas
Cayla Leonard
By Cayla Leonard
May 22, 2022
Bamboo garden close-up

If you’re looking for an easy way to make your backyard garden more relaxing this spring, then bamboo may be just the plant for you. Bamboo is a low-maintenance plant in the right climates, and its natural elegance makes it a perfect way to turn any garden into a zen garden. You can plant bamboo as part of most normal gardens, of course, but if you’re feeling a bit crafty then why not spice things up? Here are four tips to help with your backyard bamboo garden design.
1. Tall bamboo fences
Bamboo can grow quite tall, making it an excellent living fence. You can plant bamboo around the edges of your yard to grow a privacy fence, but there are other options, too. Plant a line of bamboo along the back edge of your garden to form a delightful backdrop for the rest of your plants. Just remember, as the bamboo grows taller, it will cast shade over some or all of your garden.

You can use lines of bamboo plants to turn your lawn into a series of smaller, partitioned garden rooms, as well! It’s a good idea to sketch out where you want your rooms to be and then plant a line of bamboo along where you want the wall or walls. Be sure to leave gaps to serve as doorways, so you have easy access to the garden rooms.

Read more
Transform your garden this summer with these 6 DIY pallet garden design ideas
Rebecca Wolken
By Rebecca Wolken
May 8, 2022
Person sitting on wooden pallets

There are always fun ways you can save money in the garden. And recycling materials to make new things is not only good for the environment, but it's fun too! That's why we've gathered all the best ideas for recycling wooden pallets in the garden.

Maybe you consider one or more of these ideas to use up those pallets that are lying around your yard, or perhaps you have several, and you can build a whole new garden made entirely of recycled wooden pallets. Let's dive into these homemade pallet garden design ideas to help grow your garden and make it a unique place to spend time!
1. Recycled pallet compost bin
One of the most expensive items in a garden is the compost bin. Buying one brand new can be costly, but building one out of used pallets can be a wallet saver and a planet saver! To make one, you'll need at least three pallets for a three-sided compost bin, but four if you'd like to close off that fourth side.

Read more