I really like having a wreath on the front door at Christmastime. But am I the only one who finds it doesn’t work so well in practice? It always seemed like it was banging all over the place and that I would get impromptu cornea surgery via pine needle whenever I tried to come in holding a baby and some groceries (which is roughly 98% of the time).
But, we do have these lovely sidelight windows on either side of our front door, and for a while I’ve thought that they would look pretty with wreaths. Of course, though, it’s not that easy to find a five-inch wreath. As often happens with crafts around these here parts, I got a germ of an idea in my head, and started looking around at random junk we had lying around, and pretty soon I was able to come up with all the parts and pieces we needed to make mini wreaths for the sidelight windows. You certainly don’t need sidelight windows — mini wreaths would look great in a row in any windows on your house.
Here were the materials I gathered:
- one old bent tomato stake that had been used by children as a weapon in the backyard (a wire hanger would also work just as well)
- pine branch that fell off our Christmas tree when I brought it inside (oops!)
- wire cutters
- floral wire
- red ribbon (ok, I did buy that)
- suction cups from a plastic container in the bathtub that holds some bath toys…the boys always rip it off the wall to play with the container as well, and so the suction cups just sit on the wall by themselves
- stapler
- scotch tape
Here is Henry with all the supplies.
First we straightened out the tomato stake, measured it, and cut it in half. Then we bent each half into a circle. (Note to Eli: underwear first, THEN pants.)
We cut the tree branch into pieces 3-5 inches long, and cut the floral wire into pieces about 4 inches long (the boys had the most fun cutting up the floral wire). Then we just slapped the branch pieces onto the tomato cage circles, securing them with the floral wire. Remember to make the branch pieces right-side-up (i.e., with the tops of the leaves showing).
Here are our two finished wreaths. One branch was plenty for filling both of these (the bonus of making mini wreaths is that you don't need much pine). I filled them as best I could and then used leftover branch bits to fill in any areas that looked sparse. It's a pretty casual affair: the tomato cage and floral wire are both green, so they blend in nicely and you don't have to get crazy anal about covering everything.
The back of a wreath.
I measured the sidelight windows and figured out how long the ribbon would have to so that the wreaths would hang in the middle of the window. I cut two pieces (one for each wreath) that were twice that measurement, and looped each piece through the middle of a wreath. Then I stapled the ends together to secure it.
I made a bow shape out of another long piece of ribbon. Here I've secured it with a staple, but don't do that. I ripped the staple out right after I took the picture because it was holding the bow at a funny angle.
I took a 2-inch piece of ribbon and wrapped it around the center of the bow. I used a piece of scotch tape to hold that together on the back.
Stick a piece of floral wire through the back of the bow's center piece, and then thread it through the long ribbon that is attached to your wreath. Then, wind it some more around the suction cup.
Stick the suction cups on the windows, and you're done!
This entire thing took less than an hour, and that was with copious kid “help” and distracting loud Christmas music playing. It’s several days after I made them, and they haven’t fallen apart yet, which is a true sign of craft success here at World of Julie.
You forgot the part about being in your underwear.
Oh yes, I’m always in my underwear. (Note that I also always have pants on OVER the underwear, however.) (Note also also that it is somewhat of a triumph that Eli has clothes on at all, never mind that he put them on in the wrong order.)