Halloween Countdown: Spooky Glam Wreath

Today I’m sharing a Halloween wreath I made for my partner in the Mini 13 Days of Halloween Swap. I love making wreaths! It’s a great way to use bits and bobs from your craft stash. This one is a little bit spooky and a little bit glamorous.

I wrapped some lacy ribbon around a straw wreath form to cover it completely. Then I wrapped some black eyelash yarn around it which added some great texture. I then started layering on things to see what worked. I began with some fake spider webbing and stretched it across the top of the wreath. 

 I didn't want to overdo it, just wanted it to be a little bit spooky. I then made a little banner from some burlap ribbon I had and stitched the word “BOO” using some chunky yarn I had on hand.

 Then I added a some small metal flowers I had in my stash to anchor the webbing and banner. I added a large paper flower and a “P” for my partners last name which I coated in some lovely aqua flaked glitter.

I’m so pleased with the result.  I hope it helps to spook up my partner’s place for many years to come!

Spring has Sprung...or something like that

Boy am I glad Spring is finally here!  We've had a pretty rough winter, lots of snow and ice and I'm over it.  So here’s a few Spring and Easter crafty thingies to help get us over winter.

I made a couple of garlands out of some foam bunnies and chicks that I picked up at Target in the $1 bin.  I mean really—super simple. For the bunnies, I did add some flower stickers to them to add a little Spring color. 

For the chicks, I had Baxter do a little finger painting on them to add some color and have something for his room.  I really like them…and hopefully I can hang on to this for the years to come.  He’s already ripped it down once and torn one of the chicks in half so we’ll see about that.  

 I also made Spring wreath. It needs a little something else, but until I figure it out, it's perfectly fine how it is. 

Once again, I'm burning through my craft stash.  The flowers are crocheted and I got them at a thrift or flea market years ago.  The bird nest was used on a diaper cake at my baby shower!  It had the ivy attached to it which I think looks great hanging from the wreath.  

So I'm going to think a bit and play around with this wreath a bit when I have the time.  It just needs a little something.  

Are you working on anything to welcome Spring? 

St. Patrick's Day crafts

In continuing with trying to decorate the place for each holiday or season, I finished up a few crafty bits for St. Patrick's Day!  This is another holiday I never really decorated for, but why not?  So bring on the green!

I started with a little wreath for the front door.  Again, I used things I already had on hand, except for the wreath form itself. 

I made some fabric flowers like I made for my wedding using some gold-toned buttons in the center---thinking it would look a little like gold coins.  I also made a few more of the felt flowers like I made for my Fall wreath.  I wrapped the wreath form in a bright, green fabric.

Then I made a few felt shamrocks using this tutorial (found through Pinterest---of course!) I'm not sure they look shamrock-y enough, but I think they are good enough for now and get the point across. I just pinned these on, so I can remake them some time, probably with some better quality felt. I just had some of the cheap stuff on hand.  But for now, it will do.

Here it is on my door (sorry for the grainy photo).  It really pops against the black.  I like this little wreath.  It was fun to make, didn't take a lot of time and screams St. Patrick's Day.  

I also made this garland.  I bought one pack of foam shamrocks from the dollar store.  One pack had these two colors in it, a bright green and a glittery, dark green.  So I just strung it up with some string and voila!  Instant decoration.  Gotta love easy, cheap, quick decorations. I can see adding a bit more to this garland, maybe decoupaging some themed images on the lighter green shamrocks.  Something to work on over the upcoming years.  I think that's the point of starting to decorate for holidays.  I'm just starting with a few things, but over the years I know I will add more!

Last but not least, I made another little garland with some leftover bits from making the wreath, an extra shamrock and two fabric flowers.  I hated to see them just get thrown into my mess of a craft storage area, so I thought I could make another garland with them. I made some circles out of scrapbook paper to add to it and added a couple of pom poms and that was that.  Easy Peasy. I hung it from my bookcase. Just a little touch of green, but it works for me!

Do you decorate for St. Patty's Day?  I would love to have some stitched goodies.  I think that's something to work on, maybe some tea towels or a throw pillow.

So now, it's on to the next thing.  I've got a few cross stitches I'm still working on and plan on making a Spring wreath.  I also need to make some spring and Easter themed decorations for my apartment.  I've got a few ideas churning inspired by Pinterest. I still struggle with finding time for myself, it's still a work in progress. 

 See you next time!

A Wintry Wreath

I have been on a wreath kick lately, wanting to make all kinds of wreaths for all the seasons and holidays.  I've been pinning some amazing wreaths on Pinterest. I've got so many I want to make!  But seeing as it is currently winter, I thought I'd start with a winter themed wreath.  In keeping with one of my crafty goals for the year, I used supplies I had on hand. Here's my result.  I'm totally in love with it.

It's wrapped in yarn, then sparkly star garland, added some crocheted snowflakes, a few old Christmas ornaments and a little cardinal.  Simple, but pretty.

I used this wreath form that I already had. I did leave the plastic on it, thinking it wouldn't snag the yarn as I wrapped it.  The yarn I've had for a while and it was plenty to wrap this wreath and have some left over. 

To start wrapping the yarn, I just made a knot in the yarn and stuck a pin through it into the wreath. I think it will hold pretty well.  I really didn't want to break out the glue gun.

Here it is all wrapped up nice and warm.  You'll see I still have quite a bit of the white yarn left--yay more projects!  The best advice I can give about wrapping the yarn is keep the tension throughout so you don't get strange gaps.  Other than that, it's a bit of a tedious process but goes pretty quickly.

 

I gathered up the materials I had planned on using.  I didn't use much of this stuff!  I had these grand plans of using these turquoise ornaments all over the wreath but it just wasn't working.  So I'll save those for another project as well.  I have a lot of these crocheted snowflakes that I knew I wanted to incorporate as well.  

 

I have two packages of this shiny star garland that I bought after Christmas a couple of years ago.  I decided to wrap this around the wreath to give it a bit of sparkle. 

 

 I like the contrast between the star garland and the soft yarn. 

I added the little cardinal and blue snowflake.  I love images of bright red cardinal in the snow.  Such beautiful birds. 

 I made a little garland with a few of the snowflakes and added those so they would hang in the middle, then added three of the blue ornaments.  These were the only ones that looked good when they were wired together.  The others were leaving too much of a gap for my liking. I used a thin wire to affix these to the wreath.

And that was it!  It didn't really take too long and the end product is super cute and I love seeing it on my door.  A great mix of sparkle and warmth.  Very wintry indeed.

Next up, I would like to work on a Valentine's Day wreath.  I may just try to rework the one I already have. I've got some pink Christmas ornaments I think may work!

Do you hang seasonal wreaths?  I think it's so fun!

'Til next time!

It's Fall Y'all

What is it about Autumn that we love so much?  The air is turning crisp, the leaves are changing colors, the squirrels are busy gathering food, and pumpkins are everywhere.  It's quite perfect. Since I had some extra time on my hands the past couple weeks, I decided to make myself a fall wreath because for some reason, I didn't have one!  That had to be remedied. I've seen all these wonderful wreaths made with felt flowers all over Pinterest so I decided that's the kind of wreath I wanted to make, perfect for fall I think--something about the coziness and warmth of felt perhaps. So here's what I ended up with!

Can I just say (and not to toot my own horn)....I love it!  I think it's absolutely adorable and  the colors and different styles of flowers came together so wonderfully.

I used tutorials from here and here and they were pretty easy to make.  The flat, layered ones I just eyeballed and stitched them with a little design in the center with embroidery floss. When I was making the rolled ones, I was never able to use all the felt from the circle, so I trimmed off the ends and made the small buds with those leftovers.  The loopy ones are super simple and turn out really pretty.  For bigger flowers, just keep adding more strips.  The tutorial starts rolling from the outside and works in, I did the opposite and just rolled them up and added more strips as I went if I wanted a bigger flower.  I used the good 'ol craft felt that you get at the craft store.  You can't beat the price and I definitely had a budget for this project.

I started  by wrapping my wreath with this cute calico fabric that I already had in my stash.  I thought it was very fall-y. I had just enough to wrap the whole thing--phew!

 Then gathered up my flowers. I did lay them out on the wreath just to see how it would look, how many flowers I actually had (would they cover the entire wreath or just some of it) and what sort of layout I wanted.  I ended up making enough to cover the entire wreath so that's what I did!  The colors I chose were mustard yellow, dark turquoise, coral, off-white, yellow and brown. Then I hot-glued them all in place.  Hopefully it will hold up.  I may have to reattach through the years with a stronger glue, but for now it works just fine.

These are the little buds and I'm so glad I made them because they were perfect for filling in spaces after I had glued down the larger flowers.

 

This wreath makes me happy and isn't that what crafting is all about? I could make tons more of these and would love to make a Christmas/Winter one!  Can I just get paid for making these?  I mean that would be perfect!

I'm back at work now since the government reopened, so I'll have a bit less time to create, but I hope to make more time for myself to make things. So for now. I'm back to working on my Halloween Spooky sampler and  I just ordered two of The Frosted Pumpkins Stichery's Christmas patterns!  Eek I can't wait to see what the patterns are! See ya next time.

'til Then!