Like many, Christmas is my FAVORITE time of year! I find it to be magical. The lights, the music, the smell of burning logs, getting together with friends and family, the food!

The Christmas decorations have started to go up in the Nguyen casa. This year I thought it would be nice to try using real garland.  I plan to purchase them a little closer to Christmas so they don't dry out before hand.  While researching how to keep real garland fresh I found a few tips.

If you are wanting something with a little less maintenance, Kelly from A View Along the Way has a trick where she adds fresh cuttings to fake garland.

Here is an image of her dollar store garland.

She then collected clippings from around her house and from the clippings bin at her local garden store.

Then tucked the real clippings into the fake garland.

TA-DA! Clever, huh?

A word of caution for those with small children and pets. Popular berry-producing plants such as Hollies, yews, mistletoe, ivy, Jerusalem cherry, bittersweet and crown of thorns all produce poisonous berries. Keep them out of reach from children and pets and be sure to discard any berries that may fall.

If you have some additional tips to keeping your garland looking fresh, please share them with us.

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