Alternative Christmas Tree with Balloons

This alternative Christmas tree started out life as a balloon advent calendar. I have a friend who’s daughter is doing 11+ exams in the new year. Its really tough, and understandably she’s struggling to stay motivated. I filled the balloons with sweets, and thought it would be a nice start to each day is she could pop a balloon every to get a treat.

The idea came from a balloon pop birthday count down for Abbi a few years back that was a huge hit.

However….

I completely underestimated how difficult it would be to push sweets into 25 balloons. And definitely didn’t consider that I would stretch the rubber and compromise the rubber in the balloons, meaning that they started to deflate after only 2 days!

Part of the problems was that the sweets I chose were too wide. (It was seriously difficult getting some of them into the balloons). I’m sharing what I did anyway, as you could substitute thin sweets, which slip in without stretching the neck – or little motivational messages on paper. Though in all honestly they would definitely not be as well received as chocolate in our house.

It made a made a funky alternative Christmas Tree for a few days before starting to deflate.

So rather than an advent calendar, it would make a nice party decoration, or space saving Christmas tree. Without the sweets this could easily last up to a week.

Materials

For the tree:

24 balloons
1 gold
20 assorted green
3 brown balloons
String

For the “branches”

Green masking tape
wooden garden skewers/stakes
bubble wrap

Method

Inflate all the balloons.

Add sweets if required.

Next make the “branches”. Garden skewers cut into 5 different sizes worked well for this. Wrap them in bubble wrap to give a bit of depth before covering in green masking tape.

Attach the green balloons and string in a vague christmas tree shape.

The gold balloon is a star at the top, with 3 brown balloons for the trunk.
As an advent calendar, pop the balloons one at a time until you get to the gold star. Or just hang as a cute easy and cheap space saving Christmas tree.

Here are a few more alternative Christmas Trees if you need some inspiration to get started:

Wooden Pallet Tree

Photos tacked to the wall

Egg Carton Tree

Small Apartment friendly pieces of tree

License Plate Christmas Tree

From an old Ikea christmas promotion for Billy BookcasesFound on pinterest. I have been unable to find the original source. I think its an Anthropologie store.

Another unidentified Pinterest find

And finally, combining stationery and Christmas, Two of my favourite things: Post It Note Christmas Tree

What creative christmas tree idea do you like best?

SaveSave