Recycling Your Artificial Christmas Tree.... Post 1

Now that we have a living and family room I decided to buy a second Christmas tree.  It is pre lit and takes about 5 minutes to set up.  Our old tree which we have had for 8 years is not pre-lit, and we have to put it up one branch at a time...  it takes FOREVER! 
This year, with Etta needing my time I just didn't want to put up the old tree.  In fact, I realized I may not ever want to put it up again... But what to do with it?  I hate to just trash it, so wasteful, there is a lot of great foliage in there.  So, I have come up with a few ideas

• Square wreath
• Garland jabots swags (on the stairs)
• Snowflakes
• Little mini trees in pots etc.

Today I am showing you the snowflake idea.  (tomorrow I will show you the wreath instructions!)

First you need six same size tree segments.

Pull out the bottom two branches

Wrap these two around the stem toward the center.

Leave a few inches long tail or two.

Attach to the next branch securing by wrapping the wire branch around the ends.

Til it looks like this.

Attach all branches together at the ends.

If necessary secure with a twist tie.

IF you have any of the long wrapping pieces you can also secure the center with it.

With the six branches in a circle, you want to take the next two inner branches

 and wrap them around each other.

Like so:

Continue around the circle.  This not only secures the snowflake together but creates the shape.

When you have made your way around it will look like this.

Continue around, styling as you would like!

Here is a little cheat sheet that you may save and print out to store in your box for next year!