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Crafty!

Bixby The Black Cat Halloween Wreath Tutorial

by Jill September 25, 2013
September 25, 2013

BixbyTheBlackCatWreathOh yeah.

I’m about to get all crafty up in here. It’s been a while, but there’s something about the beginning of fall that makes me want to burn my finger off with a glue gun. (Seriously, typing this is painful.)

I may have completed the ultimate DIY this summer – growing a baby – but I was itching to make me a festive wreath last weekend to mark the (hopeful) end of Satan’s fiery reign over Texas summer weather.

Now, before you go calling me super mom for crafting with a 7 week old in the house, please know that all the supplies I’m about to show you are still strewn about my kitchen.

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Psssst! Scroll to the bottom of this post if you want to see how I tweaked Bixby to be a little more simple and sophisticated!

What you need:

1 styrofoam wreath (this was a 14″)
1 spool of black ribbon (or really just a few yards)
4 marabou feather boas
2 wooden dowels (found in the cake baking supplies)
jewelry wire (gauge and color choice up to you, I used one roll)
black felt (just scraps or a couple sheets)
pink felt (scraps or one sheet)
scissors
wire cutters

Optional- if you want your wreath to have eyeballs:

2 small styrofoam balls (look for the smooth styrofoam)
green paint and paint brush
black sharpie
(Option for the option- glow in the dark glitter glue or glow in the dark green paint)

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Start by securing your ribbon to the wreath with a dot of hot glue, then wrap the ribbon all the way around the wreath. It’s helpful if you have a five year old nearby to point out all the white spots you missed. And by “helpful” I mean super annoying, but that’s what you get for crafting with kids.

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Now secure one feather boa to the wreath with hot glue, and wrap that around the wreath, keeping in mind it will have to cover 1/4 of it before gluing the other end down. Do this with all 4 boas until the wreath is completely covered in feathers, much like your floor at this point.

(Note: These boas are not cheap. Mine were about $5/each. Don’t let your toddler run off with one in an attempt to turn it into a statement piece in her fall wardrobe.)

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Poof! You now have a furry wreath. Go ahead and pet it. It won’t bite.

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Very not-so-carefully-because-this-doesn’t-need-to-be-perfect cut out 4 black triangles. It helps if you cut 2 out at a time, since you’ll be gluing 2 together to create each ear. Then cut out 2 smaller pink triangles for the insides of the ears.

Cut your wooden dowels to about 4 inch pieces (you can do this with the wire cutters, it doesn’t have to be pretty).

Use one piece of dowel to create holes in the wreath where you want the ears to be. You can use scissors to snip a hole through the ribbon if you need to.

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Glue the top two edges of the black triangles together, then glue the pink triangle on top. Stick one dowel inside each ear, then glue it down and glue the bottom of the ears shut, making sure to leave 2-3 inches of dowel sticking out of the ear.

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Then shove each one in the holes you created.

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Using your wire cutters, cut whiskers for your cat by cutting 4 equal-ish length pieces. They can be as long as you want. Lay them over your wreath to gauge that. Keep in mind you can always trim them with the wire cutters if they’re too long, but you can’t do anything but buy more wire if they’re too short.

Employ the help of your partner to twist them in the middle. Or just do it yourself if you’re patient like that.

Place them over the wreath where you’d like them, then hot glue each one where it comes in contact with the wreath.

Burn your fingers, drop 50 f-bombs, dip your hand in ice.

KIDDING! (But maybe have that bowl of ice out just in case.)

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Cut a cute kitteh nose out of pink felt. I chose to cut out several layers to make the nose a little thicker. Then I glued these on top of each other. Then glued them to the center of the whiskers.

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Now, you can stop here. I like the eye-less cat. It seems more grown-up to me. But, since grown-ups are officially outnumbered in this house, the kids won the vote for the cat with crazy eyes.

So now, the crazy eye option.

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Paint at least half of your styrofoam balls green. I just used some green fabric paint I had laying around. I also went over that with a few coats of glow in the dark glitter glue for fun. It’s not super effective, but you can see them glow a little at night.

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Once that’s dry, draw your eyes on with a Sharpie. I have no real pattern for this. I just winged it. Obviously.

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Using small pieces of dowel, insert 2 where you want the eyes to be. Then stick your eyes onto the dowels.

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If you get these smooth styrofoam balls, they have perfectly sized holes already in the back.

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To hang, just glue a little scrap of ribbon to the back.

Meow! That’s all there is to it.

I have to say, the wrapping the boa bit is WAY easier than tying a bunch of tulle on to it, like my tulle wreaths, BUT you could easily create this as a tulle wreath with black tulle. Just add all the finishing details to my original tutu tulle wreath. 

Are cats not your thing? Perhaps you should make a monster, instead. Click on through to check out last year’s Halloween wreath DIY.

TulleMonsterWreathTut

UPDATE!!! 

Hey, y’all! It’s been a year since I created Bixby, and I’ve made a couple fun changes to his tutorial to make a new, more simple, more sophisticated version. Here you go!

Start with the same wreath, and you’re totally cool to cover it in black ribbon like the original, OR you could make your life even easier and cover it with black Duck Tape!

IMG_6388

Wrap the boas around it just like in the original, and stick the ends on with hot glue.

Now instead of felt ears, how about leather? So fancy! And they don’t have to be super expensive. I picked up this bag of leather remnants for super cheap from the craft store.

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Cut them out, hot glue the pieces together, back them with something thick, like some foam. Then glue a popsicle stick down the back of them. These are much easier to find than cake dowels, and no cutting required.

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Again, like the original, use your scissors to make holes in the wreath where you want the ears to go, then press the popsicle sticks in.

Onto the whiskers! This update makes this wreath 100x easier!

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Get yourself some pre-cut, packaged floral stem wire. Super cheap, and one package will be MORE than enough for several wreaths. Then get you some beads. I bought a little pack of assorted wooden beads because they had both pink and black beads. I chose a pink one for this wreath, then threaded as many wires as I could fit through it, leaving the bead at the center of them.

IMG_6407

Fan the wires out a little on each side, then glue a few onto the wreath (not the feathers, but all the way down onto the wreath) on either side.

SimpleBlackCatWreath

Add a little bell for a touch of whimsy, and you’re done! This thing literally comes together in less than 10 minutes. And it’s soft and so cute.

 


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20 comments

MaBicheVintage September 25, 2013 - 3:09 am

Supergrappige zwarte kat #tutorial #halloween http://t.co/MonZpLfgCD

Reply
lizoham September 25, 2013 - 8:33 am

“@babyrabies: New Crafty #DIY Post! Bixby The Black Cat Halloween Wreath Tutorial http://t.co/aMAxTDcXF9” @mob723

Reply
Allie September 25, 2013 - 10:49 am

This is too cute! I wish we could hang a wreath on our front door, but we have a storm door that gets in the way. I love black cats!

Reply
Stephanie September 25, 2013 - 11:08 am

This is so cute!! I wish I had a place to hang such a cute wreath.

Reply
jennyonthespot September 25, 2013 - 3:28 pm

I. Love. EET.

Reply
Amanda9542 September 25, 2013 - 11:46 pm

Cute. I wanna make one.
#Halloween http://t.co/BRIU31JY7Z

Reply
Coffee Spark: Halloween Decorating and Crafting Tips #CoffeeSpark | Mom Spark™ - A Blog for Moms - Mom Blogger October 10, 2013 - 1:45 pm

[…] Bixby the Black Cat Halloween Wreath Tutorial […]

Reply
Last Minute Pumpkin Decor Ideas October 23, 2013 - 2:22 pm

[…] They go perfect with our Bixby the Black Cat Wreath! […]

Reply
Crystal October 30, 2014 - 1:22 pm

i love this cat. I think he would be even cuter if you let some of the feather boa hang down like a tail!

Reply
Baby Rabies | Hello Kitty Inspired Wreath Tutorial March 24, 2015 - 12:32 am

[…] so glad I finally got it into the real world. I was inspired to make it after I re-made my black cat wreath last Halloween. So if you love all things cats, you probably want to check that out, […]

Reply
kate June 11, 2015 - 6:07 am

I am so putting this on my front door,never made one before buy this looks so cute and easy

Reply
Jill June 16, 2015 - 5:50 pm

Oh yay!

Reply
Missie Floyd Weir September 21, 2015 - 5:34 pm

Adorbs!

Reply
Black Cat Wreath | hooked-on-crafting.com September 23, 2015 - 9:58 pm

[…] Click HERE  for a link to the original pattern I found.  You can see that I didn’t follow it exactly.  I opted for white floral wire for the whiskers and I didn’t use dowels for the ears — I just glued and pinned them to the wreath. […]

Reply
Suzi Pyles October 13, 2015 - 5:33 pm

I love this wreath and your funny comentary.Yes,some of us actually DO read it. My husband wanted to cheap out and make tulle,but I,(and our mostly black cat) prevailed.Going to make it today….GREAT JOB!

Reply
Black Cat roundup - A girl and a glue gun September 11, 2016 - 11:54 pm

[…] black cat wreath cat tights […]

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25 Halloween Wreath Ideas Letting You Welcome the Trick-or-Treaters Spook-tacularly Well – Cute DIY Projects October 24, 2016 - 4:40 am

[…] DIY Source : babyrabies […]

Reply
Elise January 15, 2017 - 6:33 am

If you stop where you said you could (before the eyes step) that’s the kind of thing I can imagine staying up the whole year round. Especially in a kid’s bedroom or something like that. Super cute!

Reply
DIY Cat Wreathes To Make This Halloween! – meowAF October 7, 2017 - 5:27 pm

[…] Instructions via babyrabies.com […]

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10 Unique Halloween Wreaths – KAYSWELL August 19, 2018 - 10:29 pm

[…] Photo and idea from Baby Rabies. Get instructions here. […]

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