Quick Fall Decorating Ideas
By Nancy Cavanaugh

Fall is a great time for decorating naturally. There is so much that you can get right from your backyard or on a walk through some nearby woods -- pinecones, twigs, cattails, wheat, branches, acorns and leaves. You can use these things to create wreaths, centerpieces and swags.

To create a wreath, you can either buy a grapevine wreath at the store or weave your own with twigs and small flexible branches. To help keep everything in place you can use a hot glue gun. You can make it into a circle or heart shape. Hot glue pinecones, wheat, acorns, leaves and dried flowers to give it color and texture. You can also add a bow that you make or purchase.

You can create a swag in a similar way but instead of making a circle or heart, lay the twigs and branches on the table and tie in the middle with twine. Decorate by hot gluing pinecones, wheat, acorns, leaves and dried flowers.

If you would like to be able to reuse these from year to year, you may want to consider using leaves and plastic acorns that you find at the craft store.

Fall and Halloween share many decorating props. You can use hay bales and corn stalks outside with a cheerful scarecrow. Fall flowers like mums make an excellent accent, either planted in the ground or in decorative pots. You can also get several smaller pumpkins and line the walkway to your front door with them.

Inside, you can use small squash, pumpkins and gourds in piles on tables, or lay them around the base of a fall-colored large pillar candle with some pinecones and leaves to create a simple centerpiece on your dining room table. Baskets filled with apples and/or dried flowers can be put in corners or on the porch.

You can also make floral arrangements with artificial or dried flowers and small corn or wheat stalks that are housed in a glass vase or placed in a pumpkin-shaped glass container. You can place live flowers in a real pumpkin that has been cleaned out and filled with dirt.

To fill the house will the smells of fall, place scented candles -- pumpkin, cranberry, cinnamon and chestnut -- around the house.

Have fun with these ideas. If you have other fall decorating ideas or for Thanksgiving and Christmas, please send them to me at crafts@busyparentsonline.com

Nancy Cavanaugh, is a stay-at-home mom and avid crafter. You can find lots more fun crafts for kids, ages three to seven, at her site: Kids Holiday Crafts www.kidsholidaycrafts.com