Horse Chestnut Series - Round Up & Chestnut Decorations

The beautiful Horse Chestnut Tree started out 2014 stark and bare.

By March the buds had appeared.

By the last day of April it had burst into leaf.

In May it was flushed with flower.

By July the pollinated flowers had turned to fruit.

In September the leaves began to change colour and fall.

By October the ripened fruit had fallen.

On a frosty December morning the Horse Chestnut stands bare once again.

Our Horse Chestnut Tree has given it's all; 

buds, leaves, flowers and fruit and so the cycle begins again.

This Christmas I wanted to use the lovely shiny conkers to make some tree decorations. 

The colour scheme in the bedroom includes hues of orange and browns from the Connemara wallpaper. 

For the first time this year I put a small tree in our bedroom.

 I wanted to keep it inexpensive so purchased a small fake tree for €12 and tried not to buy any decorations apart front the LED lights.

I made these by drilling holes through pieces of cinnamon, threaded them onto a ribbon, tying a loop at the top and finishing with a lovely shiny conker.

I dried orange slices slowly in the airing cupboard and made bows from ribbon left over from some curtain tie-backs. I bought the bird and the orange glitter ribbon to make bows and everything else was repurposed including an old bracelet!

I'm really happy with how it turned out and it's nice to have a bit of our Horse Chestnut Tree on our Christmas Tree!

Wishing you all a very happy and healthy New Year!