Hey! If you caught me on The Broadcast on KTXD this morning, you might be here looking for a link to this tutorial. I re-made a burlap wreath that I created last year for Christmas, repurposing it for Thanksgiving by switching out the accent fabric.
Here’s a link to the original tutorial, featured in Emma Magazine last fall.
And if you didn’t catch the segment, you can check it out here.
I think I’m getting a reputation as the crazy wreath lady because people keep asking me to make more. I guess it’s an earned reputation, though, because I never say no and always look forward to coming up with something new!
Like this burlap wreath I created for the launch of Emma Magazine. It was a nice departure from all the tulle wreaths around here.
You can read the full tutorial AND the rest of the magazine, which is full of great holiday ideas, over at EmmaMag.com. Scroll down and click on the holiday issue.
A couple notes that we weren’t able to fit in the magazine tutorial:
1. The best part of this wreath is it gets it’s beauty from imperfection. Don’t stress about cutting the squares perfectly and all to size. Fray the edges of your fabric for the bow a bit.
2. You’re going to feel like you’re messing this up. The squares will lay flat or fall to the side until you get a bunch on there and they start to fluff up. This wreath doesn’t come together until the very end. Just keep working on it. It will be beautiful.
For the rest of the tutorial and the materials list, check out the magazine.
You know I love me a festive wreath, especially one that looks nothing like those grapevine atrocities they sell at the local craft store. Last year I showed you all how to make a TuTu Cute Wreath for Halloween, and now I present to you the Felt Pomp Wreath.
Do you remember in Kindergarten when you would wrap tiny squares of tissue paper around the eraser end of a pencil, dunk them in Elmer’s glue and stick them to a paper flower to make a fluffy gift for your mom for Mother’s Day? This is made the very same way, except with felt… and hot glue. I named it the Pomp Wreath because I learned later in life that grown children who go off to college are subjected to this same monotonous crafting again, but on much larger, tortuous levels in the form of “pomping” floats for homecoming parades and such. My husband was, apparently, the Pomp Master (I think that’s just a title I made up, I’m fairly certain he doesn’t have it engraved on a paddle or anything) for his fraternity, and I think he still has nightmares of tiny tissue squares.
What you’ll need:
1. A styrofoam wreath form (I like the squared off one instead of the rounded one because it was easier to line up the felt squares and it lays flat against the door, but I’m sure a rounded one would work fine, too. I want to say this was a 10″.) – $7.99 at Hobby Lobby- used 40% off coupon to make it a little less than $5 (you can look the weekly coupon up online and print it or you can show it to them on your phone).
2. A yard of felt- I used a lovely red with sparkles for a festive touch- $5.99/yard, on sale for 25% off, making it, what?? 5ish, I guess.
3. A 30 foot/10 yard roll of satin floral ribbon – $4.99, on sale for 50% off
4. A hot glue gun and glue sticks- if you don’t have one already, you can pick up a mini high temp gun and some sticks for super cheap, like probably less than $8
This wreath wound up costing me less than $15!
First up, wrap the ribbon around the wreath. Secure with hot glue in a couple places as you go.
Then cut your squares. I must admit, that bitch-ass rotary cutter that nearly took my finger off last month really came in handy. Cut the entire yard into 4×4″ squares. Quite easy to do if you have a 4″ wide ruler.
This task is also made a lot easier if you have a sister helping you out. The poor girl never escapes my sweatshop of crafty “fun” when she comes to visit.
We cut long 4″ strips first, then cut the other direction to create the squares.
Now you’re ready to pomp your felt. Get your glue gun ready and grab a pencil. Place your pencil on top of the center of a square of felt.
Wrap the felt around the pencil and apply hot glue to the end.
Begin glueing the felt squares around the outer edge of the wreath, attaching them fairly close together so they are nice and bunched up.
Keep that up all the way around the edge. Note- This edge will actually be the FRONT of the wreath. You will fill in behind this row next. You don’t want to make this top edge too full at the back because it won’t lay flat against the door. So just fill in one row behind the first row.
Then work on the front edge of the wreath. Starting on the inside, pomp all the way around the top edge of the front, again keeping them close together. Then fill in below that with one more row. That’s all it took, 4 rows (2 on top and 2 in the front) for me to get the fullness that I liked. It also took all but 4 of my felt squares. But if you want to do more and have more felt, go for it. Whatever fluffs your wreath.
To hang it, I just attached a scrap of felt to the back of the wreath with hot glue on either end.
We have a Command Adhesive hook on our front door that I hung it on. I contemplated adding a bow to it, but I just love the clean, simple look of the red felt. I also started out doing the sparkles on the outside of the felt squares, but realized that it would be easier to see if it was on the inside, so I switched it up shortly after I started.
I think you could do this with any color. I originally wanted a bright green, but all the store had was a very dark one, so I opted for red. If you have the patience and the tools, I bet it would look awesome if the squares were cut with pinking shears or one of the decorative edges for the Olfa rotary cutter. Or you could just keep it simple like I did. I’m quite fond of it.
I would venture to guess it took about 2.5 hours from start to finish.
There you have it! In just enough time to get to the craft store today (although Hobby Lobby is closed on Sundays, sorry). Happy wreath making! Please come back and share pictures, and let me know if you have any questions.