This has been my first experience decorating a Christmas tree as an adult. After university, I always lived overseas and traveled on my holiday break. Once we moved to Japan and started our family, the girls were always so little and then there was the question of space, storage and living or artificial tree.

I ended up finding a little artificial tree at the recycling center and the girls have fallen in love with it. They made pomanders, threaded glass beads and popcorn, and covered it with the 100 tiny paper cranes that one of my husband's students gave to him several years ago.

We were missing a star though, and although the one I made for the top is a little serious for our kid- decorated tree, I hope we will grow into it over time.

Simple Steps:

I used recycled gold cardboard that I've collected, but you can use thin cardboard and gold paint to get a similar effect.

1. Cut out two cardboard circles, a little larger than a spool of thread, and then trace the spool in the center of both circles to use as a guide for gluing the spindles.

2. Cut spindles to measure: about .25cm x 6.5cm (about 75-100 pieces.)

3. Glue the pieces onto the circle.

4. Cut out your stars (2) and score. The original idea for this project came from the tutorial by grey luster girl. I changed the size and shape of my star to fit this project. To make the star, I made a paper template by folding it up like a snowflake and then cutting it until I got the size and shape that I wanted.

5. Glue your stars onto the spindles.

6. To make the base of the star, fold a piece of cardboard in half to make an ice-cream cone shape. (Simpler and more effective than the pyramid one I made.) and glue your stars and spindles to both sides.