A book Christmas tree is an easy project you and your kids can get busy with without spending much. The freezing weather outside may make the kids bored in the house so here’s something they can do indoors and it doesn’t create a lot of mess, too! They won’t even need scissors to do this.

A Christmas tree is a festive decoration the kids can display in their rooms or as a dinner table centerpiece. Making crafts out of recycled materials is both economical and environmentally friendly. Teach your kids the importance of conservation of resources with this project. It’ll help negate the paper waste that will come from gift wrappers this holiday.

Here’s what you’ll need:

• Used magazine or book
• Spray paint or poster paint
• Loose beads, buttons, ornaments and ribbons

Here’s how to do it:

1. Choose a regular-sized book or magazine. The ideal ones are paperback books, Reader’s Digest-sized magazines and telephone directories. If you are planning to use hardbound books, remove the hard covers and the spine first before starting.
2. Wear out the book spine by opening the book all the way. Do this several times on different pages to completely loosen up, but not tear apart, the spine.

3. Start folding the pages. Fold each page diagonally twice to create a tree-shaped cone. This should be pretty easy for the kids to do. You can let them use a paper creaser to prevent paper cut injuries. This should take less than an hour to finish.

4. The book will now be shaped like a cone. In order for it to stand, fold the bottom triangle on each page and slip it inside the page fold. This will give it a flat base.

5. Fold the book or magazine covers the same way as the rest of the pages. If it’s too thick, you can cut out the portion from the first triangular fold.
6. You can glue the covers together if the tree doesn’t automatically take a conical shape.

7. Start decorating the tree. A spray paint was used for this sample, but poster color can also be used. A glossy magazine may already be colorful enough so you can skip the painting part.

8. Add ornaments and garlands using loose beads, buttons or cut-out paper shapes. Let the children be creative in decorating their tree. You may need to provide hot glue service for the ornaments (put hot glue where they need it).

9. Display the Christmas trees around the house. You can make a bunch of these using different sized books to create a mini forest that you can put by the doorway or around the big Christmas tree.

This project can be done even with only a few more days to go before Christmas. Share your creations with us by sending a link to your photos.