‘Tis the Season to Deck the Halls!

Kitting out your home with seasonal decorations can be fun and festive, but not necessarily free. But covering your lawn with inflatable decorations or trees with plastic garlands is not your only option for seasonal fun! There are other ways that you can get into the spirit as well as provide ornamentation that will not hurt our backyard wildlife.

Here are four DIY wildlife-friendly winter decoration ideas — with downloadable step-by-step instructions.

Natural Garland

Making a garland can be a fun way to create a decoration for your trees (inside or out), mantel or windows.

STEP-BY-STEP DIRECTIONS

  1. Decide what look you are going for and what materials you need/can access. Will it be a long garland that stretches sideways or will it be a series of garlands that hang down?
  2. Tie a knot in your string and proceed to string your items. For some materials, like cranberries, orange slices or other food materials, you will need to thread the needle, inserting into an item and threading the item along the string. For cones you may need to tie the string around one end.
  3. Once it is as long as you would like, tie a knot at this other end.
  4. Wrap your garland around your Christmas tree or outdoor trees to welcome winter, celebrate the winter solstice or just pretty up the garden! Place indoors along mantels or suspend in window.

Learn more about helping Canadian wildlife in your backyard at CanadianWildlifeFederation.ca/Gardening

Download this PDF, including material list and tips>

@cwf_fcf Looking for a fun, easy and inexpensive way to make garland this winter? Look no further! Head out and look for pinecones, tree clippings and a nice looking branch. The oranges were dehydrated in an air fryer on the lowest temperature setting. Use what you have! Link for step-by-step instructions are in the blog post 👉 blog.cwf-fcf.org and look for “4 DIY Wildlife-Friendly Winter Decorative Ideas” If you make a natural garland, please tag us (@cwf-fcf) – we would love to see it! #domoreforwildlife #faislepourlafaune #chrismastree #christmasdecoratingideas #christmascrafts #giveagifttowildlife #holidaycrafts ♬ I Can Feel It (Christmas Instrumental) – Nick Sena and Danny Echevarria

Snow Animals

Have some healthy fun with friends or family by creating snow animals. Don’t worry about getting them perfect, as approximate shapes should be clear enough for folks to know what they are.

STEP-BY-STEP DIRECTIONS

A very simple version is to form an oblong shape on which you fix a small snowball at one end for the tail and two eyes (with berries or piece of small twig or cone) and two ears (with leaves, if there are any, or a few twigs placed together) at the other end. A more realistic version is making the same body but add an egg-type shaped snowball for the head, small round ball for a tail and long flatter shapes for ears. A bunny sitting up will have similar shaped body parts but with forearms that are more noticeable, perhaps holding a carrot. Eyes can be small seed heads from Brown-eyed Susans or dark berries.

Learn more about making snow animals>

Download this PDF, including more animals, material list and tips>

Ice Lanterns

This winter, decorate your front porch, steps or walkway with these all natural and attractive ice lanterns!

STEP-BY-STEP DIRECTIONS

  1. Fill the bottom of your lantern container with a little water and some decorative items, then freeze until solid. Try and keep the middle bit flat, checking to ensure the items haven’t moved when they started freezing. This will help your tea light burn evenly and minimize the heat on the lantern walls.
  2. Place smaller container in the middle of the now frozen base in your lantern container. Fill with stones or other similarly heavy item.
  3. Pour water in the space between the two containers and fill with decorative items. Put somewhere to freeze.
  4. Once completely frozen, remove the stones from the inner container and add warm water inside (not so warm it will crack your container, if glass). This will help release the container from the ice so you can then slide it out.
  5. Run warm water over the outside of your lantern container to help the ice lantern within to slide out. Take outside to the cold as soon as possible.
  6. Place tea light inside, light and enjoy!

Learn more about making ice lanterns>

Download this PDF, including material list and tips>

@cwf_fcf DIY ICE LANTERNS ❄️ Decorate your front porch, steps or walkway this winter with these easy, inexpensive, all natural ice lanterns! Step-by-step directions found on blog.cwf-fcf.org (look for 4 wildlife friendly winter decoration ideas)! #domoreforwildlife #faislepourlafaune #chrismastree #christmasdecoratingideas #christmascrafts #giveagifttowildlife #holidaycraftsforkids #holidaycrafts ♬ Warm Christmas Lofi Beat – Gloveity

 

Twig Tree Decoration

How better to celebrate our beloved trees than to make one as a decoration.

STEP-BY-STEP DIRECTIONS

  1. Decide roughly what size of tree you want to make and snip the twigs to the size you want, keeping in mind you may want the side twigs to be longer than the bottom twig. You may also wish a short twig for the trunk at the bottom.
  2. Place the twigs where you like and then attach with a glue gun. Put a small dollop on the end of one twig and then attach.
  3. Tie some jute twine or yarn to one end and start wrapping around the tree. Hold as firmly as needed to keep the yarn taut but not so hard that it breaks the twig frame. You can be methodical and even for a very tidy look or go at all angles for a more artsy look.
  4. When you are satisfied with how it looks, cut the yarn and use the glue gun to attach the end to back where it won’t be noticed. Alternatively, you can tie it if you feel you can keep the tension nice and taut.
  5. (Optional) You can go a step further and decorate this tree by gluing coloured buttons, mini pom poms, tiny golden stars or anything else that appeals to you!
  6. If you wish to hang the decoration, cut a piece of twine or yarn, fold in half and glue gun the two ends to the back of the tree, near the top. Stay in the middle to allow the tree to hang evenly

Get more do-it-yourself ideas at CanadianWildlifeFederation.ca>

Download this PDF, including material list and tips>

@cwf_fcf How better to celebrate our beloved trees than to make one as a decoration! Check out: blog.cwf-fcf.org and look for “4 DIY Wildlife-Friendly Winter Decoration” for step-by-step guide! 🎄  Quelle meilleure façon de célébrer nos arbres bien-aimés qu’en en fabriquant un en guise de decoration! Lien 👉 blog.cwf-fcf.org #domoreforwildlife #faislepourlafaune #chrismastree #christmasdecoratingideas #christmascrafts #giveagifttowildlife #holidaycrafts ♬ Christmas song "Let's decorate" – 3KTrack