This may be the perfect year to simplify our holiday decorations. Rather than buying new items, dig around in your closets and see what you can reinvent.

Think about the magic that can be wrought by just a can of silver, gold, or red spray paint. Tired or battered ornaments can be sprayed red, silver, or gold and nestled into massed greenery freshly cut from the garden (yours or a friend’s). This looks perfect on a mantle or entrance hall table, and the greenery will have a lovely fresh scent.

Also, those massive blooms that are drying outside on your ‘Limelight’ or other varieties of hydrangea shrubs can be useful indoors if cut with long stems. Remove the leaves and spray the bloom heads bronze, silver, or gold and display them in a large vase indoors or by an entry way on a front porch. They can also be made into wreaths to hang on a door, or over a doorway or fireplace.

Find a low container and put some oasis in it and use any old, dried flowers that have been sprayed to make a centerpiece. Or fill the oasis with small pieces of evergreen cut from the garden and poke some shiny balls or ornaments between the greenery for a low centerpiece.

You can also fill clear glass vases with real or artificial oranges and lemons for a mantelpiece. Most of us have dried flowers or leaves that can be sprayed gold and put into vases with the oranges and lemons or with cut greens for a new look. Take risks and recycle old toys and other items that can be reincarnated as holiday art.

Note: Bare branches in a tall vase hung with ornaments and/or bows are also easy decorative items.

This is Moya Andrews and today we focused on holiday decorations.