When decorating your yard for the holiday season or looking for outdoor Christmas decor ideas, work with what you have. Look around your yard and the exterior of your home for existing elements that you can work into your Christmas decor displays.

If you have a good view of your back yard through the windows of your home, its lovely to carry your holiday season decorations into the back yard as well – creates a nice visual focal point for you and your holiday season guests to enjoy.

Here, a bird bath that is normally a feature of the summer landscape is transformed into a beautiful Christmas display in winter by first creating a bed of evergreen branches in the basin, and then nestling shiny colored glass Christmas ball ornaments into the nest of evergreen branches.  Note that ball ornaments of varying sizes are used to create an additional element of visual interest, but of course, if all you have is ball ornaments of only one size, that works too. A super-large ornament ball completes the look like a topper on a cake.

A really beautiful and festive Christmas display to decorate either your front or back yard.

From Martha Stewart,  here’s a fantabulous idea for your outdoor Christmas urns if you’re looking to do something new this year.

An outdoor urn is filled with evergreen branches (juniper, cedar, pine, fir, etc) – make sure the branches hang generously over the edge of the planter for that lush abundant look.   Then colored glass balls are stacked into a gentle cone shape in the center of the urn.

Again, to rock this look, its all about abundance, so you’re going to need a lot of glass ball ornaments!  When you fall short of the abundant look, your designs can end up looking a little anemic (aka “cheesy”!).

The trick here is that you’re going to need to glue the balls in place, otherwise there are simply not going to stay put. Don’t be daring and try it – a good gust of wind will send those babies flying, evening if you think you’ve managed to stack them securely.

Use a hot glue gun and glue as you go, one ball at a time. Don’t use a lot of glue though – a little dab will do. If you apply too much hot glue to delicate glass balls, they do run the risk of shattering or cracking.

There is nothing more welcome than the front entrance (exterior) of a house festively decked up for the Holiday season.  It may be cold outside, but it makes a home look warm and cozy as guests arrive, and gains the admiration of passersby.

Here a really abundant pine garland is swagged around the door for starters. And, by that way, that’s really key – when using a garland to adorn your front door, you don’t want it to look anemic, so use a really full, lush garland to get that abundant look.
Next, its all about the urns.  They may hold geraniums or petunias in the summer, but when the weather turns nippy, you want to get those babies filled with festive holiday decor. Again, make them FULL, and lush – remember, think ABUNDANT for the best visual effects. And to really make the display striking, you need height – that’s where the tall branches rising up from the center of the urns come into play, really capturing the essence of nature and spirit of the season at the same time.

This living room, decorated for Christmas, is a beautiful example of simple Christmas decor. It is classic simplicity for those who prefer to keep things understated.

From Canadian House and Home, an understated living room is given a shot of punch with bright purple and orange toss cushions. The jewel tones are reiterated in the orange holiday ornaments on the ottoman to give a burst of cheer to the neutral palette.

A small and simple table top tree sits in front of the window, while the mantle is adorned, but with classic simplicity – a simple evergreen garland is swagged over the mantle, free of a lot of frou-frou, and a small silver-white ornamental Christmas tree stands on each end of the mantle top.

Pink Christmas decor ideas. Image Credit polyvore.com