My lovely wreath

After painting the front porch and cleaning the back porch I still had a few hours of daylight left and I wanted a wreath and to cover up those ugly sharpie house numbers. While storing sutff in the garage, I found a few boards and a some foam pipe insulation and was inspired.

I have a strange love of wreaths and door hangers, but actually own surprisingly few. I end up throwing them out after each holiday and starting over, so for this wreath I decided to use velcro and a chalkboard. That way I can just change the stuff when I'm tired of it. YAY!!

Here is my wreath:

I found a few inspirations from the web, but ultimately came up with my own design.

 You will need:

linings from the old dresse

2 yards of muslin fabric

a pair of old blue jeans for the leaves

polyester lining or silk fabric (I used the lining of my sister's old bridesmaid dress which were cut out so they could re-wear them for a "27 dresses party)

To create ruffles:
I used the tutorial from positively splendid ...so easy!! Just set your sewing machine tension to the highest level and set it to the longest stitch length and it ruffles for you. I cut the about 1 inch strips with pinking shears. Sorry no pics of the process, I'm new to this.

To create the flowers:
I cut several different size circles from the lining then ran the edges along a candle flame. The edges will turn a little black, but you can trim it off if you want. I chose to leave it as it kept with the rustic look. Then I threaded a star button and sewed through all the layers.

For the leaves:
I used pinking shears to cut leaf shapes from an old pair of jeans and then ran it through my sewing machine. They curl nicely!

I then glued the flowers, leaves, and a wooden heart I had to a piece of felt and added velcro to the back.

I wrapped the ruffled strips around the form, securing with hot glue as I went (in retrospect - should have used low temp glue. The hot glue melted right into the wreath). I added velcro for the flowers and glued on a slate (bought from Michaels). I tied on a ribbon, and hung it on the door.

note: we did have to go back and add a wire coat hanger to help the wreath keep it's shape. If I make another one I will do this before adding the ruffles.

Here it is on my newly painted front porch! So Patriotic.