Rustic Christmas living and dining room ideas

It's time for another beautiful Christmas home tour and today, I get to share my rustic Christmas living and dining room ideas with you! As always, I'm using lots of greenery to create simple Christmas room decor that anyone can recreate.

This Christmas home tour series was organized by Marty of a Stroll Thru Life. White Christmas or not, from your front door to your dining table, you're sure to find plenty of inspiration here, for creating holiday cheer in your own home.

At the end of this post, you'll find links to all of the beautiful homes on the tour!

If you are new here or coming over from Heather's at Southern State of Mind, welcome! I'm Jayne a Brit living in Germany. There's nothing I love more than celebrating a German Christmas with my family. There are so many lovely Christmas traditions here and I especially love the homemade ornaments, decorations, and Christmas cookies!

Table of contents

• Start with a color scheme
• Christmas living room ideas
• Christmas wreaths
• Decorating ideas for behind the sofa
• Green garlands
• Nativity scene
• Christmas table decorations
• Fire place mantel
• Conclusion
• More Christmas ideas
• Continue the Christmas home tour here!

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Start with a color scheme

Last week's post was all about styling your coffee table for Christmas. If you read that post, you'll know how much I love to create a color theme for my rooms during the holiday season.

To create a cozy festive feel for my Christmas living and dining room ideas this Christmas, I've gone for rustic Christmas decorations and used lots of natural materials like moss, pine cones, cinnamon sticks, orange slices, and fresh greenery.

Christmas living room ideas

Let's start the tour in the living room. We usually have a beautiful Christmas tree standing in the corner of this room but to make sure it stays fresh, we cut it fresh on the third Sunday in Advent. That means our Christmas tree won't be decorated by the time this post goes live.

The coffee table is always the first thing you see when you enter the living room so, of course, it's the perfect place to decorate for the Christmas season.

Festive coffee table decor

The main decoration on the coffee table is a long wooden bowl. You can use a dough bowl to create a similar effect.

To create a festive feel, I've filled the bowl with Christmas ornaments. Natural accents like wooden stars and orange slices add to the rustic look.

I've twisted some battery-operated fairy lights throughout the vignette, tucking the battery box under the decorations.

Ribbons are a lovely way of adding festive cheer to your tables. Here I've placed a length of classic red wide-band ribbon along the center of the coffee table.

★Tip★: Run ribbons along a plain tablecloth or runner to create an elegant look.

This is the perfect place for taking a break with a cup of hot cocoa and my favorite holiday magazines! See my Instagram Reel here to see what I mean and to get a glimpse of my wood-burning fire!

Coffee table books

Coffee table books add a little height to a tiny festive display. Tiny trees sit atop a scrap piece of chippy wood with white paint!

Mini bottlebrush trees are very popular holiday decorations because they add an instant festive vibe to vignettes.

You can read more about using coffee table books in your Christmas decorating in last week's blog post.

Christmas wreaths

Green garlands can easily be twisted into small wreaths. Here, I've added some natural textures to a rustic-style wreath. I clipped some evergreen branches from the garden and found some faux ivy to make a mini wreath for the coffee table.

A rustic Christmas wreath like this one would also make the perfect centerpiece for your holiday table.

You'll see another DIY wreath on the dining table further down the page.

★Tip★: Here's a great tutorial for making evergreen wreaths.

Decorating ideas for behind the sofa

For the vignette behind the sofa, I've used more natural elements.

A mini Christmas tree on the left balances the clear glass bottle display on the right. The glass bottle is filled with more organic elements like green moss, pine cones, and orange slices. I've added some pine branches and pheasant feathers for more festive cheer.

For me, there's no better way to decorate than with fresh greenery. Not only does it look great but the smell of fresh pine needles always gets me in the holiday spirit! Last year, I decorated with lots of mini evergreen trees but because of my foot, I haven't been able to get out to the garden supply store to get them!

That's not to say I only use fresh greens because I don't. I also understand that some people either can't get fresh evergreens or don't want to deal with the mess and that's fine too.

The pine wreath hanging over my vintage mirror is faux. It looks so real, you'd only know it was faux if you felt it with your fingers.

Of course, I've added more candles here too. Can't beat candles for creating a cozy vibe!

Green garlands

Christmas living and dining room ideas with garlands

This year, I've draped a green garland underneath the picture shelf. String lights create a bit of festive cheer because you know how much I love my twinkle lights!

In the dining room, both the vintage secretary desk and buffet have been dressed up with green garlands - and string lights of course!

Nativity scene

I love this little nativity scene. It's made from bakelite and is really old. Last year, one of the pieces broke but thankfully, I managed to glue it back together!

Christmas table decorations

This has to be one of the easiest Christmas Day dinner table designs I've ever created. I know I say that every year but it's true!

Place settings

Carrying on from the green themes, I've added a mini Lindt chocolate Santa Clause to each place setting. I think I might even earn a few bonus points from my boys for that haha! Mini snowmen or candy canes would also make great additions to your place settings especially if you have kiddos at the table.

Christmas table centerpiece

I always think the important thing is not to go overboard with festive decor in the dining area. Guests need to be able to talk to each other and should not have to compete with the table decorations!

For this year's festive tablescape, I've used more natural elements. A rustic wood slice creates the base for the centerpiece.

For the base of my Christmas table centerpiece, I made a simple evergreen wreath from some of my garden clippings, some naturally dried seed pods, pine cones, and orange slices.

The vase in the center of the wreath holds a bunch of evergreen clippings together with some dried seed pods from 'love in a mist'.

To create a bit of bling, I've hung some Christmas ornaments around the top of the vase. I've used mini metallic ornaments in neutral colors but you could easily use different colors to suit your personal style.

Fire place mantel

The fireplace mantel has been decorated with paper stars. Paper stars are easy to create and make beautiful living room decorations. If you'd like to make some, you can find the paper star tutorial on my blog here.

★Tip★: Get creative with your Christmas decor. Learn how to make some gorgeous paper stars that you can use year after year!

Conclusion

I hope you've enjoyed my Christmas living and dining room ideas! There are lots more ideas on the blog, take a look at some of the Christmas posts mentioned below.

Don't forget to visit all of my friends' tours where you'll find lots more beautiful Christmas decorations and decorating ideas!

It's the most wonderful time of the year so get those jingle bells out and start your decorating today!

Now hop on over to Tamara at Citrine Living. I love the color scheme Tamara has chosen for her home and just wait until you see her beautiful Christmas tree - it's a stunner!

Merry Christmas!

More Christmas ideas

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Continue the Christmas home tour here!

A Stroll Thru Life - StoneGable - Thrifty and Chic - Southern Home and Hospitality - Worthing Court

Tuesday December 6th

Our Southern Home - This is our Bliss - The Stonybrook House - A Pretty Life In The Suburbs - Up To Date Interiors - Shiplap and Shells

Wednesday December 7th

Whispering Pines Homestead - Calypso in the Country - White Arrows Home - Designing Vibes - Decor to Adore - Clean and Scentsible.

Thursday December 8th

CitrineLiving - Pasha is Home - County Road 407 - Simply2Moms - Southern State of Mind - Chalking Up Success

Friday December 9th

Hymns and Verses - Eleanor Rose Home - Dimples and Tangles