Decorating your house for the holidays is as easy as foraging in your own backyard
This wreath is made from “bits and bits” of items picked up while walking after a big storm. Pine, fir, rosemary, magnolia leaves, succulents, and berries are wrapped into the wreath.
Tip: Supplement the wreath with items found at a floral market, then follow our complete wreath-making directions.
Use a piece of found driftwood as a rustic backdrop to moss, small evergreens, and succulents.
Tip: Fill crevices in the driftwood with enough soil to anchor your plant tableau firmly.
In a season that’s often predictable, mix it up with a rosemary-nest place setting and a centerpiece of forest finds (take care with wild mushrooms; many are poisonous).
Tip: Rosemary stalks should be long and tender enough to curve into a bowl shape. Add kumquats for a splash of color.
Instead of decking the halls with boughs, use felled branches to make your own right-size Christmas tree. Buy a piece of cone-shaped floral foam and insert branches. Once the tree looks full enough, add succulents, berries, and leaves. Ornaments not needed.
Tip: Water greens daily to keep them look-ing fresh. save-on-crafts.com/foamcones.html is a good source for foam cones.
Recycle a wooden crate into a front-porch planter box; for a statement, use plants of differing heights. This arrangement includes fruiting citrus, lavender, rosemary, and large and small succulents.
Tip: Before planting, arrange plants still in their pots to see if the symmetry works.
Shown at left:
12 other items we love to forage: