Tomato Cage Tinsel Trees

So I have seen plenty of these floating around on the internet, starting in as early as September. Some people just wrap the lights around the tomato cages and call it day. Those are fine too.  I like the version with the tinsel as it looks very festive in the day as well as at night.

A couple a things…

If you are doing this in January you are saving yourself some serious moolah $$  as your materials, such as lights and tinsel are on CLEARANCE right now at most stores. And if you use materials i.e., tomato cages, spray paint, bricks or zip ties that you already have even more savings. I had old tomato cages, zip ties, spray paint, pots, and bricks lying around so savings and upcycling!

One last thing, when I attempt these projects I am going to tell you ALL about them.  The Good, the Bad and the Corrections.  One of the reasons I am starting this whole endeavor was to share with you my mistakes and faux paus so you don’t have to.  Maybe we’ll call my DIY projects the “Cautionary Tales.”  

Let’s Begin!

Materials needed:

3 Tomato cages (You could do 2 but I like the look of the 3 together)

1 roll of heavy duty twine

a lot of tinsel (I will explain in more detail)

1 can Green spray paint

2 strings of 50 lights

1 string of 100 lights

1 pkg of zip ties (which I didn’t think to use until I was almost done with the project)

3 large garden pots

7 large bricks

        

Lay out your tarp and put your tomato cages down so you don’t get paint everywhere. Ties the tops of the tomato cages into a tee-pee top, where are three legs come together. Tie very tight.  (little secret here, i forgot to do this in the “before” and had paint ALL over my hands when I was done - chalking that one up to my excitement to do this project) Added benefit of doing it before you paint is that the twine is then hardened and painted to match at the end of your project!

Normally, I would lecture here about the importance of prepping your material to be painted.  In this particular instance we don’t care.  All we are looking for is stickiness.  You can use spray adhesive (but this is cheaper) AND it will disguise the tomato cages under the tinsel. Plus I can see where I have sprayed. So spray away! Just make sure you have good coverage.

Now you could do these trees individually. But I am afraid I am always a little time crunched to wait for the perfect environment/time.  Why am I telling you this?  Because things get a little hectic in this project for just a little bit.  So you waited for the paint to get a little tacky and really quite sticky.  Good job!  Pull out your first string of tinsel (probably 12 ft or more) and start at the top by tucking the end into the tacky twine and getting it good and stuck in there (I wrapped mine around the tee-pee top a little bit for added security).

So on the biggest cage I used 4 strings of 12 foot tinsel and it was a sparse at the end. On the small cages 4 strings were just enough to do a good job of coverage.  So if you are covering the larger tomato cage use at least 6 strings of tinsel.

Once all cages are covered, I let them dry overnight.  I wanted the tinsel good and stuck in that paint.  AND it was!  Now you cover with the lights.  Start at the top by threading the “female” plug into the top of the tee-pee.  Wrap around evenly so as to spread lights out.  (something I thought of later as added security to the lights staying in place better were zip ties.)  Take zip ties and tie the lights onto the cage and tinsel. (about 5 or 6 per tree) Cut the ends of zip ties off or spin them inside of the tomato cage. Make sure the “male” plug has a little extra length at the end to reach your plug.

Now pots.  I chose to put mine in pots, reason being that a lot of the time when I am decorating the outside of my house for Christmas it’s already sub-zero temperatures. Have you tried putting stakes in the ground when it is frozen?  Measure the opening of your pots to ensure that the cages will fit down inside them all the way to the bottom.  Place cages in pots and slip the bricks down inside the cages trying to cover a bit of the bottom wire of the cage with at least 1 brick.  I chose bricks because a) I am not a fan of pea gravel or limestone rock.  b) it’s what I had lying around.  And as I stated before this project was a 2 parts I want to try this and 1 part what do I already have lying around that I could use for this project (upcycling).

This step was tricky but it kept the cages secure in high winds, toppling the whole tree as compared to the tree rolling around in my front yard unsecure.  (We had 60 mph winds the VERY first day I put these up)

Voila!  Gorgeous decorations for WAY cheaper than you could buy at Target or Home Depot.