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Lemon Ornaments: Christmas Tree Decorations with Little Money

After seeing Holly’s genius tattooed fruit , I had an idea for a super cute and fairly inexpensive Christmas ornament.  This idea, snowballed into a bunch of ideas and my brainstorm flurry led to this beauteous sketch below.  And yes, my handwriting really is that bad, and yes, I make up these horrible little sketches all the time!
If you have strong branches on your tree, you might be able to figure out an easier way to hang your lemons.  However, the little tree I was going to decorate is totally wimpy, so I had to get creative.  To make the Lemon ornaments, I cut off the top and hollowed out the center with that zester tool-a-ma-bob pictured below.  I think a melon baller would work as well.

 Next, I poked a hole through the lemon ends with an ice pick.

I used a wooden skewer to thread my ribbon through the top and the bottom.

 I secured the bottom with a knot and pulled tightly until the top appeared reattached.

 Then following the directions on my Silhouette tattoo paper…

 ….I tattooed my lemons!

Here they are looking adorable!

Now, I couldn’t just decorate a tree with lonely lemons, so I made some butterflies and paper cones out of scrapbook paper.  I also made tissue paper flowers, but those looked horrible!

I have NO idea why this picture below is sideways and refusing to be vertical, but it just adds to the kookiness of my tissue paper flowers.  I sooooo thought they’d look great on the tree. I was wrong.

So, I did away with the flowers, and opted for the simpler tree.
Aren’t the lemons the cutest?

To secure the butterflies to the tree, I hot glued small clothespins to the back of each butterfly and simply clipped them to the branches.

The flowers were still alive in a pot in my yard, so those got clipped to fill the paper cones.

The whole reason I made this tree today was to showcase an ornament that I haven’t even made yet!  Creative craziness I tell you!  I’ll be guest posting over at Stephanie Lynn’s next Tuesday where I’ll show you another great handmade ornament.

In the meantime, enjoy these!

Below are the templates I used for the butterflies.  Simply grab the picture and open in Word.  Resize as desired.  

If you want a template for a paper cone, click here.
I hope that if you want to change up your holiday decorations this year, and don’t have a lot of money to do so, you’ll be inspired by this post to think outside of the box!
p.s. Winner of Bag Full of Posies giveaway is Kathy of Creative Home Expressions! Congrats Kathy!!!
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Comments

  1. I can’t wait to decorate a tree in this at my daughter’s middle school! Their colors are black and yellow, so this will be perfect & unique! Love it!

  2. What fabulous ornaments! Although Christmas has just ended these could be used for so many other things:)

  4. Everything is absolutely beautiful, I must come back for a longer visit. You have so many wonderful ideas to share.
    Sue

  8. Beth,

    The black and white along with the yellow is gorgeous and of course I think the tattooing is genius! Thanks for linking back to me.

  9. Great idea!!!! Even adding one of these to an indoor tree would smell heavenly! I'm featuring you in my favorite finds this afternoon 🙂 Stop by!

  14. That is lovely! Modern meets Victorian! The butterflies could be used in a lot of ways! Thanks for the inspiration!

  16. i love your outdoor tree! don't hate me for thinking the yellow flowers looked cheery 🙂 i think i might steal your idea and make some cones filled with bird seed and put them in the trees in our garden. thanks for the inspiration. found you through tatertots

  17. Very creative you! Great idea to put a clothespin on the back of the butterflies. I love it! I just got done telling my daughter that I'd really like to make whatever further decorations I need this year {after I see what I've actually got} using up supplies I already have on hand. It can really add up and get crazy!

  18. This is SO cute, Beth! How sweet can it get?? Love the lemon ornaments…thanks so much for the instructions!

    XO,
    Jane

  19. I love decorating with fruit around the holidays. Clove studded oranges have been a favorite since I was a wee one – and the house smells so good when they are finished! Now I have another fruit decoration to mix in with the rest. 😀

  22. So precious!! So creative! I really love the way you show your ideas on paper and close up pics of how-tos.

  23. Okay… I'm LOVING those lemons for an apothicary jar, or maybe at a place setting for a summer party!

    So creative! 🙂

    ~Shelley Smith
    houseofsmiths.blogspot.com

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