Like the look of pine cones, but only have the skinny ones nearby? Here’s a flashy pine cone centerpiece made with things you probably already have.

Walking around the neighborhood, I found plenty of pine cones, but they were the unattractive, skinny kind. They seem unfinished, and didn’t have the presence to become the center of anything. The first step is to fluff up those pine cones.

Pine Cones Before

How to Open Pine Cones

Bake them. That’s right. I baked mine on “warm” in the oven for about 3 hours, which fluffed them right up, and killed any freeloaders that I might not want crawling around on my dining room table. Be sure to line baking pans with aluminum foil to protect them from sap.

Then I sprayed them with Rust-Oleum stainless steel paint, silver paint, and silver glitter paint, project paint I had left over. I added some short sticks, also glitter-sprayed.

You could add any metallics to this dish. Mixing metallics is actually quite trendy these days, like I did here with the gold-patterned table cloth and the silver shimmer on the pine cones.

One other thing I love about this project. Since it’s not Christmas-themed, you’ll be able to leave this out for winter decor through January if you’d like.

Pin this one for a simple, natural, and free winter or holiday decorating idea.