Why not decorate your tree with toilet rolls this Christmas?

Decorating your Christmas tree with toilet rolls? It’s not as crazy as it might sound. 

You know we love a toilet roll-related craft, even more so when it’s festive! So why not make some Christmas decorations out of toilet roll!

Tis the season…

Christmas is a time of overconsumption, which also means even more waste is produced. Some estimates suggest that 114,000 tonnes of plastic packaging will be thrown away and not recycled in the UK this Christmas. So, we all need to be mindful of the little ways we can cut down on waste this festive season.

While many of us will reuse our Christmas decorations time and time again, why not take it a step further and create your own decorations from household waste and a lick of paint? 

And, because we’re so great, we’ve got three different toilet roll decorations to try out, so read ahead and decide which one you want to make… 

And remember to supervise children when crafting – especially when you’re using a glue gun or scissors!

Snowman decoration 

This is the easiest of our toilet paper decorations, all you need is: 

• Toilet roll core 
• White paint 
• Ribbon/thread 
• Glue (either PVA or a glue gun)
• Scissors 
• Biodegradable white/silver glitter (optional) 

How to make:

1. Cut your toilet roll core into three equal sections. 
2. Paint each of your sections white paint. 

Optional step: If you want a little extra glitz, you can also cover the sections in biodegradable glitter! Choose wisely though; most glitter contains microplastics that takes years to degrade. 

3. Glue the pieces together – stacking them on top of each other to look like a classic snowman.
4. Wrap a piece of ribbon around where the top two pieces are glued together for a scarf. 

Optional step: If you want to give your snowman a face, use a piece of white scrap paper or tissue paper. Cut a circle slightly larger than your top circle and draw your face on. Then glue inside the circle. 

5. Use a piece of ribbon to create a hanger. We glued the ribbon to the top of our snowman ornament but you could also pull the string through the opening of the top of the snowman ornament and tie it off. 

Bingo! You’ve got a happy snowman for your tree.

A Christmas tree for your Christmas tree! 

A miniature tree for your Christmas tree, what could be cuter! 

What you’ll need…

• Two toilet paper cores
• Paint of your choice (a traditional green and brown? A rainbow tree? It’s up to you.)
• Glue (either PVA or a glue gun)
• Ribbon/thread 
• Optional: pom poms or other decoration for your tree

How to make:

1. Cut your two toilet roll cores in half longways. 
2. Leave one piece as it is. Holding the pieces horizontal, cut a little bit off each piece, cutting a little more as you progress through the pieces, so when you arrange them they form a lovely triangular tree shape. Keep one of the scrap pieces to use as the tree stump. 

3. Paint the tree in your selected colours. We’ve gone for a traditional green for the tree and brown for the stump. 

4. Once dried, lay all the pieces out to form a tree and glue them together. 

5. Decorate your tree! Either with paint, you can also glue pom-poms on and biodegradable glitter. 

6. Glue a loop of ribbon to the top piece and there you go, now you can decorate your tree… with your tree! 

Castle ornament 

This ornament is *slightly* more difficult than the previous ones, but it’s still a doddle and can be done with the kids. To make a princess castle ornament, what you’ll need is: 

• A toilet roll core (of course) 
• Scrap cardboard (an old tissue or cereal box will do) 
• Scrap paper OR paint for decoration.
• Glue (either PVA or a glue gun) 
• Scissors 

How to make:

1. Cover your toilet roll core with decorative paper or paint it in a colour of your choice.

2. Cut out a small ‘archway’ about an inch high in your tube.

3. Now for your base: Cut a cardboard circle with a diameter of 6.5cm. 

4. For the roof, cut out another cardboard circle with a diameter of 12cm.

5. Decorate both your roof and base however you like. You can use paint or scrap paper, however, covering the roof in scrap paper might make it a little harder to bend into your roof in the next step…

6. Lie a loop of ribbon or string the centre of the straight side of the semi-circle and glue it into place. 

7. Take your half-circle and glue the ends together (as shown in the image) to create a cone. If you have a paper clip or binder clips, use these to hold while drying.

8. Once everything is dry, glue your tube to the base by running a bead of glue around the top edge of the tube. Set roof down, press firmly and allow to dry.

9. Do the same with the base – run the glue around the bottom edge of the tube. Press onto your base.

10. Add any additional decorations – you could write the name of your closest princess on the castle and it’s ready to hang on the tree! 

Make sure to share your toilet roll creations with us on Facebook and Instagram.

If you’re looking for more toilet roll related crafts, or a homemade gift for that stationery lover in your life, head over to our just for fun page and find out how to make a toilet roll pen holder!