The holidays are upon us and if you haven’t considered your decorations, you’re running behind.

Here are a few ideas that you might be able to pull from your own garden.

Greenery for your mantle: Small leaved magnolias or southern magnolias will work for some larger applications. (Larger mantles or armoire toppers.) Also, you may want to consider large branches of a holly bush/tree. The red berries on the holly will add a nice festive splash of color.

For a pleasant scent, try wax myrtle branches. The bayberry scent will permeate throughout the house/room. Wax myrtle will need to be kept in large weighted vases.

Another decorative foliage plant that had a pleasant scent is juniper. There are many cultivars of juniper. In fact, there are so many that I’m sure you’ll find the perfect one for your decorating application. They have different scents too. Did you know that an Eastern Red Cedar tree is a juniper?

How about the silver dollar eucalyptus for a colorful, scented addition to your holiday spread?

For a creative quick fix for holiday decorations, prune some limbs from one of your deciduous trees and spray paint it any color you like. Place the painted branch in a bucket of sand and decorated it.

Basically I’m suggesting that you bring in some of the outdoors for the holidays now.

Here’s a safety tip for you … please keep your greenery sprayed with water on a daily basis and if you use candles this season, keep them safely away from the foliage and never leave a candle unattended. During the holiday season, I check the charges on my fire extinguishers and get them refilled, if needed.

Hanukkah began last week, Christmas and Kwanza are next week and the Winter Solstice is in a couple of days. Get busy!

For those of you who celebrate the Winter Solstice as I do, it officially occurs at 6:22 p.m., CST, Dec. 21, 2006 in the northern hemisphere. The days start getting longer then. I usually leave my decorations up until the day before Groundhog Day.

Happy Holidays everybody!

For more on these and other gardening tips log on to the Home Grown Tomatoes website @ http://HGTradio.net.