How to Create a Nostalgic Christmas Tree Your Family Will Love

Last Updated on November 28, 2023 by lindseymahoney

Decorating the Christmas tree is my favorite activity during the holiday season! The tradition of unwrapping each ornament and reminiscing about where we bought it or who made it is so special. There is something so comforting and nostalgic about decorating a Christmas tree with family memories.

How to create a nostalgic Christmas tree that feel timeless and classic every holiday season

I am excited to share with you some of the tips and tricks when decorating a Christmas tree and the materials I like to use.

Let’s get started!

What type of Christmas tree do you buy?

Every year, Chris and my daughter visit the same parking lot the day after Thanksgiving and pick out our Christmas tree. There are various types of trees to choose from, but my favorite is the Frasier fir.

The branches on a Frasier fir are tighter and sturdier than others which makes them great for supporting heavier ornaments.

When picking out a tree for our home, they look for a tree that is nice and full and about 8 feet tall.

Source List for our Christmas Tree

What are the best lights to use for the Christmas tree?

I like to use warm white lights AND colored lights on our Christmas tree! The LED string light options are improving and there seem to be better white lights that have a warmer tone rather than the cool white.

How many Christmas lights do you use on your tree?

This year I went all out on the lights!

I wrapped our tree in 1,800 colored lights and 600 white lights. A Christmas tree really feels magical when it glows! Wrapping the tree with 2,400 lights will definitely make it glow. Ha!

How do you hang lights on a Christmas tree?

For the best results, wrap the branches to make the tree really glow. Wrapping the branches gets the lights deeper into the tree and creates more of a 3-dimensional look.

I like to start from the bottom and work my way up. Once I wrapped the tree in the colored lights, I followed that same process with the white lights.

The last light strand will attach to the glowing star on the top of the tree. A star that lights up is a MUST!

How do you make a Christmas tree feel classic and nostalgic?

To create a truly classic Christmas tree that feels nostalgic every year, I believe that the ornaments should have meaning. We have one tree that we decorate in our home and it is filled with craft ornaments our kids made at school, ornaments from vacations, or ornaments representing some sort of memory.

Every year when each ornament is unwrapped I can tell you the story of where it came from.

Color-coordinated Christmas trees that are styled perfectly are so beautiful, but each ornament doesn’t hold a memory.

We may add another tree or two in our home at some point, but the nostalgic Christmas tree that holds all of our memories will always be the star of the show.

Hanging Christmas Ornaments

How I decorate our nostalgic Christmas tree for a traditional and classic feel!

Decorating the tree with all of our collected ornaments is my favorite part of the Christmas season. Our tree is filled with a mishmash of kids’ crafts, ornaments from family vacations, and things that we love.

Every ornament that I unwrap has a story, and I love remembering each memory as I hang them on the Christmas tree.

The ornaments on the lower half of the tree are reserved for more resilient ornaments that cannot be broken if they fall. It is also the section of the tree that the kids like to decorate.

I reserve the top of the tree for more fragile ornaments.

When decorating the tree, I like to step back every once and a while and look for any empty spots. To add dimension and depth I like to hang a few simple bulb ornaments deeper into the Christmas tree.

Add tinsel to make your Christmas tree sparkle

This is our first year adding tinsel to the Christmas tree and I can’t believe it took me this long to use it! My daughter helped me to spread one package of tinsel on the tree and it is shimmery shiny magic.

When applying the tinsel, the goal was to avoid too much clumping of tinsel strands. I slowly dragged a pinch of tinsel across branches and let one or two catch.

Evelyn’s process was much more fun where she tossed the tinsel strands at the tree and let them catch on any branch they wanted!

Where is the best place to put a Christmas tree?

Personally, I love when Christmas trees can be seen through a window in the front of the house. When we first bought our house I immediately imagined our Christmas tree in the bay window.

We placed it in the window for one year and then realized we preferred it tucked in the corner next to the fireplace where it can still be seen through the window.