Easy Idea- How to Light Up Your Inexpensive Fall Garland

Here’s how my entry looked before any decorations.

Step one was just hanging the garland around the door. I have some little nails that are permanently mounted around the door for seasonal decor. They’re painted the same color as the house so that they don’t show too much when the house isn’t decorated.

As you can see, I also added straw bales and other decorations at the same time. You can see everything I did to my front door and courtyard and outdoor furniture by v isiting my site (the link is above in the intro section).

I placed pumpkins on either end but I didn’t like that weird gap between the garland and the pumpkins. It seems picky perhaps, but it just didn’t look right.

Here I moved the 2 pumpkins to one side and then took another picture. I find that taking pictures helps me see the problem in a design more clearly.

I've been a Real estate broker and house flipper for many years and, as crazy as it sounds, I sometimes tell my clients to take a picture of their kitchen and then see through the camera lens, what needs to be removed to make their kitchen look better.

So anytime I’m doing a project to the house, I take pictures and then analyze the way they look through the camera lens rather than with my own eye.

Now we’re getting somewhere! I added a tall pumpkin stand to the right side, and with the pumpkins on the left side, it looks more complete.

Time to light it up!

I took simple fairy string lights and twisted them around some of the leaves.

Twisting them helps to secure them in place. I like to place them behind the leaves so that it looks like they’re glowing from within.

Here’s another closeup.

I hid the power switches behind the garland and placed them all together. This way I only have to go to this one spot to turn them on.

I did use a lot of strands of lights. I used 4 per each side. 8 total around the door.

Once I turned them on, they looked magical! The photo doesn’t even do it justice.

You can see it much better using this quick video of the front entryway.

We live in Florida and getting a feeling of Fall is difficult. But these lights, straw, and the outdoor pillows I made really made our courtyard get that Autumnal feel!

I hope this can help inspire you to decorate your porch, door, or courtyard area too!