Outdoor Holiday Decorating Ideas

Make the outside of your home as festive as the inside with these fast, simple holiday decorating ideas.

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Jingle Bells on Potted Plants

Extra-Large Ornaments

Yarn-Ball Wreath

Natural Luminaries

Watch: Create a Holiday Luminaria

Twig Sculpture

Frosty Hanging Baskets

Lighted Trellis

Wintry Double-Glass Candle Display

Snowy Sled Display

Beautiful Birdhouse Display

Watch: Create a Natural Christmas Urn

Natural Container Holiday Show

Poinsettia Luminarias

Globed Christmas Lights

Christmas Ornament-Filled Glass Cloche

Leafy Luminarias

Illuminated Ice Parfait

Potted Frasier Fir

Glowing Holiday Globes

Fir-Filled Vintage Wheelbarrow

Evergreen-and-Cranberry Candle Ice Mold

Layered Nature Vase

Fruit-Filled Birdbath

Inviting Holiday Mailbox

Wintry Birch Box

Christmas Light-Illuminated Glass Cloche

Holiday Bench Decor

Christmas Window Dressing

Christmas Light-Wrapped Bicycle

Winter Lantern Post

Wintry Window Sills

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Jingle Bells on Potted Plants

Put outdoor plant containers to work year-round. Filling them with fir cuttings and trimming them with jingle bells add a little color and playfulness, even when the snow comes.

Extra-Large Ornaments

Ever noticed those extra-large ball ornaments for sale during the holidays? This year nab two of them for a front entry that the neighbors will talk about. Tie a thick red ribbon around each ball and nestle the ornament in a topiary (a fir wreath can help stabliize the ball). This technique also works great with a garden-style gazing ball.

Yarn-Ball Wreath

A rustic wreath comes together in minutes and can brighten up your outdoor Christmas displays. Wrap balls in white yarn, leaving a tail that can be used to connect the ball to a fir wreath. Hang from your front door or an outdoor column or light post.

Natural Luminaries

If you live in a snowy climate, put the white stuff to work! Fill containers with packed snow, adding a glass vase with an oversize red pillar candle inside. Group your decoration around a lone tree or as a beautiful runway to your front door.

Watch: Create a Holiday Luminaria

Add to your outdoor holiday decor with this natural-theme luminaria.

Twig Sculpture

White twigs rise from a mound of potted juniper, making a small container stand tall. Snowy-white Mitsumata branches lend a striking profile and contrast with the red pot. Insert shimmery red ornaments and natural pinecones into the greenery for a color and textural impact. A faux bird resting on a branch injects a bit of whimsy.

Editor's Tip: Make it your own. Choose redtwig dogwood, birch, or spray-painted twigs to create this display. Besides white, twigs painted silver or gold will shimmer in the winter light.

Frosty Hanging Baskets

Dress your porch in holiday style with hanging baskets frosted for the season and filled with sparkling accents. Frost a hanging wire basket with spray paint. Hot-glue felt snowflakes to a white or frosted indoor lamp globe. Nestle fresh-cut greens in the wire basket and top with the embellished globe.Place a string of batteyr-operated lights inside the globe to illuminate from within, and hang the arrangement from your porch ceiling, arbor, or other garden structure.

Editor's Tip: Add oversize stiffened-felt or white-painted wood snowflakes to the vignette. String them from fishing line or attach them to greenery swags suspended from porch pillars or rails.

Create a complementary snowy mantel.

Lighted Trellis

Accent architectural features with a Christmas flourish. Seasonal greenery (real or fake) plus strands of Christmas lights take a trellis from summer-only to holiday-ready.

Wintry Double-Glass Candle Display

Turn inexpensive glass cylinders into little winter wonderlands. Place one cylinder inside a larger one, sprinkle fake snow between the two, and add a sprig of cedar (clip from the yard or a ready-made wreath). Pop a votive or pillar candle into the inner cylinder and display on an outdoor table swathed with a white tablecloth.

Snowy Sled Display

When not cruising the snow-covered hills, an old sled embellished with pine sprigs, pinecones, and fruit does double duty as a welcoming decoration next to the front door.

Beautiful Birdhouse Display

Welcome feathered friends throughout the winter with a feast of fruity branches and seed heads, including rosehips, red and blue viburnum, golden millet, coneflower, canary grass, broomcorn, and cattail. Top the display with a small tree-form holly, a weatherworthy birdhouse, and a dish of black sunflowers seeds.

Watch: Create a Natural Christmas Urn

Add to the beauty of your outdoor holiday decorations with this natural urn that will thrive season after season.

Natural Container Holiday Show

A super-size cone from a sugar pine brings star power to this container display. Set the pinecone upright amid a bed of moss and spruce sprigs dotted with small pinecones. Top the pinecone with a faux cardinal for eye-catching impact. A potted evergreen in a complementary green, such as this compact 'Blue Star' juniper, creates a striking combination of natural elements.

Learn tricks for making a pinecone-and-moss display.

Poinsettia Luminarias

Light up a wintry night with glowing poinsettias encased in ice. Start with a small bloom clipped at the base. Seal the stem with a flame, and place the bloom facedown into a large plastic cup. Pour distilled water -- it makes the clearest ice -- into the cup, filling it one-third full. Place a smaller container in the center of the cup, weighing it down with rocks to create a hollow center in the mold. Freeze until solid. Thaw the ice slightly to loosen both containers and place a votive candle inside.

Globed Christmas Lights

Spheres of grapevines wrapped in lights become shimmering orbs on a coat of freshly fallen snow. Place these magical globes in birdbaths, urns, or on stairsteps to cast an ethereal glow on your outdoor landscape.

Safety Tip: Use an outdoor-rated power cord. Check the tag on the cord to verify it's safe to use outside.

Christmas Ornament-Filled Glass Cloche

Add a little Christmas glamour to a rustic entryway during the holiday season. Hold a glass cloche upside down and fill with shiny red ornament balls. Cover the top with a festive holiday plate and carefully flip over. Display your Christmas ornament-filled cloche among gardening gear on a side table next to your front door.

Leafy Luminarias

Cylindrical glass vases light the way when filled with river rocks, magnolia leaves, red winterberries, and long-lasting pillar candles.

Illuminated Ice Parfait

Make a glowing outdoor parfait by alternating layers of cranberries and ice. Use a 2-liter bottle for the mold, and create a hollow space for the candle with a 1-liter bottle (fill the 1-liter bottle with rocks so it doesn't float). Add a few inches of water and drop a row of cranberries into the gap between the two bottles. Freeze the layer solid, and repeat two times. Thaw slightly to unmold and place a lighted candle in the center.

Editor's Tip: Place the glowing ice parfaits on fence posts or use them to illuminate your walkway.

Potted Frasier Fir

Dress up your exterior for Christmas with winter containers filled with evergreens and natural bursts of color. Make a potted Frasier fir merry with a combination of pretty garden items, such as dried artichokes, pear gourds, dyed eucalyptus, caspia, astilbe seedpods, dried hydrangea blooms, and a pinecone garland.

Glowing Holiday Globes

Glowing frosted globes (available in large and small sizes from home-improvement stores) take the edge off a chilly winter twilight. Scatter the spheres around the garden to create an ethereal winter landscape, or group them in a birdbath or other outdoor winter container for maximum impact.

Safety Tip: Plug the outdoor-rated power cord into a ground fault interrupter (GFI) outlet or a circuit with a GFI outlet on it.

Fir-Filled Vintage Wheelbarrow

A front porch container overflowing with evergreens and winter plants adds charming country Christmas ambience to your entryway. Fill a vintage wheelbarrow with wintry noble fir branches. Accent the display with Port Orford cedar, dried eucalyptus, and winterberry holly. Park the display on your front porch for a homespun welcome.

Evergreen-and-Cranberry Candle Ice Mold

A frozen ring of redtwig dogwood, evergreen cuttings, and cranberries warmly embraces a pillar candle. The tall glass holder lets the candle burn brightly -- and safely -- amid the branches. Use a flexible cake carrier to mold the icy arrangement.

Layered Nature Vase

Glass vases are the perfect vehicles to showcase layers of materials. Vary the materials and colors according to your own decorating scheme. Put a coarse texture next to a smooth one and put contrasting colors close by.

Editor's Tip: Wrap a vase in layers of cloth or paper when you bring it back indoors to let it slowly acclimate to the warmer temperature so you don't end up with a cracked container.

Fruit-Filled Birdbath

It's safe to set this dazzling decoration outside once the animals have left for warmer climates. Frozen sections of kumquat, cranberries, pepperberries, and polished stones provide a striking contrast to the bright white snow.

Inviting Holiday Mailbox

Prepare a merry welcome at the curb -- a pretty swag of pine tied on with wire adds a flourish to your mailbox. Enhance it with red accents and pretty pinecones. The first snow will only enhance the look.

Wintry Birch Box

Dwarf conifers and other cold-hardy evergreens are available in many forms, colors, and textures. For a holiday-inspired window box, plant small specimens of cedar, cypress, and euonymus in a sturdy, deep box trimmed with white birch branches and garnish with pinecones and arborvitae cuttings.

Christmas Light-Illuminated Glass Cloche

A string of lights nestled inside a glass cloche draws guests to your front entry. Display your illuminated cloche in an urn, birdbath, or on an outdoor table.

Safety Tip: Don't exceed the recommended maximum number of light strings in a series.

Holiday Bench Decor

Give a bench some holiday spirit with an arrangement of holiday greenery, pinecones, gazing balls, and ornaments. Spray the arrangement with a light dusting of fake snow for extra winter flair.

Christmas Window Dressing

Fill window boxes with cedar and boxwood boughs, green hypericum berries, and sprigs of baby's breath stuck into a dry block of florist's foam. Protected from direct sun and weather extremes, cut greens can survive throughout the season.

Christmas Light-Wrapped Bicycle

For a seasonal work of art, wind vintage-style outdoor bulbs on yesteryear's two-wheeler from its handlebars to its spokes. Park it along a decorative wall or prop it against a fence.

Winter Lantern Post

Old-fashioned lantern posts are elegant on their own, but for the holiday season, wrap them in lush garland and glowing globes for a shining holiday look.

Wintry Window Sills

Turn your dormant window planters into decoration space by planting hardy shrubs. Simple wire stars and glowing white lights add holiday spirit.

Outdoor Holiday Decorating Ideas

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