Patriotic Yarn Wreath

So, I had been seeing a lot of yarn wreaths on Pinterest, and decided to give one a try. I wanted a patriotic one for the summer and saw this one at Naptime Crafts. Here is my version, inspired by hers.

I started with a floral wreath that I got from Wal-mart. The main reason I went with this was because I got it on clearance for $1.50. I think the straw wreath probably would have been easier to work with, but I like the different shape this floral wreath gave the finished product. I measured the diameter of the wreath and marked out where I wanted my red and white stripes.

Then I started wrapping the yarn. I didn't want to cut the yarn with every new stripe, so instead I kept the red and white yarn balls attached and would loop them around each other as I started a new stripe. I would do a rough pass, just to mark out the edges of the stripe. Then I would do three slow passes with the yarn. First pas make sure I covered all spots of the inner side of the wreath, second pass covered all bare spots of the front side of the wreath, and the last pass to cover any remaining bare spots on all sides.

Next, I added the loop to hand the wreath with. I used some of the blue yarn and tied a large loop. Then I wrapped it around the top of the wreath and l made a slip knot. I put some hot glue under the knot, after it was tightened, to keep it from sliding.

Finally, I painted an assortment of wooden stars white and hot glued them to the blue portion of the wreath.

After it was dried, I hung up the final product!

A Summer Wreath

With Easter done and the decorations down, I needed something to hang on my front door. I wanted something with bright colors that would work until time to start putting out harvest deco in late September. After looking at door wreath ideas at Paper Wings and A Glimpse Inside, I tweaked their ideas and combined them to make a wreath all my own.

First, I headed to my local D.I. (kind of a Goodwill type store) to find a frame I liked. Then I searched all over town for a wooden S. Let me tell you, not easy to find. Had to wait a week for JoAnn's to get some in. Meanwhile, I found some small wooden letters that I thought would be nice for a 'welcome' sign on the wreath.

I also got some yarn on sale at JoAnn's and rounded up paint that I had laying around the house and got started. First I sanded and painted all the wooden pieces, using a spare pizza box to protect my carpet.

Then I wrapped yarn around the edges of the frame, attached the S and hot glued on my 'welcome'.

Then I added silk flowers for some color.

While I used mostly blues, greens & yellows, I decided to throw in pinks and purples with the flowers to reflect all the little girls living in the house. I am happy with how it turned out. It did rattle a lot on the door when I first hung it up and I was afraid it was going to fall off. My dear hubby suggested gluing some magnets on the back (we have a metal door) and that did the trick to give it the stability I wanted.