neutral fall wreath ... ♥

One of the things i love about NY is our Autumn season

it's my favorite time of the year weather wise

(as long as we don't get any early snow storms)

and i've been slowly (very slowly) working on a little bit of fall decorating 

i am anything but traditional when it comes to holiday decorating ...

i love using neutral colors, so that it's easy to add pops of colors here or there 

without everything looking too "theme-ish" ...know what i mean??

so i'm lovin' the burlap/white combo on this wreath i made for my front door :)

(i'm calling this a wreath, even though i said i wouldn't)

(but now i am, 'cause well, i guess if it's hanging on the front door

you can call it a wreath, even though technically, it's not)

moving on...

here's how you make one of your own ♥

i started out by tracing a pretty scalloped frame shape onto brown paper

cut it out then traced that shape with a sharpie onto a large sheet of styrofoam, 

that can be found in the floral department at any craft store

(with the wreath forms and such)

now this stuff is pretty thick & crunchy, so power tools are needed

the hubs used a jigsaw to cut this out for me :)

use a small dowel rod or a few wooden skewers to connect the to sides together

finish off with hot glue 

once you've got the form together, now it's time to cover it 

cut long strips of felt at approx. 2 inches wide

(i probably had 6-8 strips measuring 2 yards each)

i then ran them through the sewing machine sewing a line down the middle

with a dark brown thread, just to add some color and break up the white

wrap the felt around the form starting from the back

straight pins work great with the foam, no hot glue is needed 

here's a peek at the back ...

keep going until it's completely covered :)

(it took me an hour or so, to get it just right)

embellish as you please!

i cut some leaf shapes out of burlap and some more felt

then used my zigzag stitch to sew them together

give them a little bit of a layered look

pinned them on and stuck some pretty feathers here and there :)

i love finding these little loopey frames (that's what i call them)

at thrift stores or yard sales ... i snatch them up since i seem to use them all the time

for different things ... a little spray paint is all they need :)

all done :)

it's a lengthy project, but in love how it looks on my front door

it blends well with my other fall decorations

hope to show you more of them soon!

gladness in my ♥ for you

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