Yarn Wreath Tutorial

Last weekend it was a bit chilly out.  So, I decided to make a new wreath for the door!  I have been trying to get a wreath to put up for each season, so this is my spring wreath!

The supplies for this were less than $10 (I used a coupon for the wreath form, and the silk flowers were on sale!) and it took me a couple hours to make - most of that is wrapping, and wrapping, and wrapping yarn ... and my skein of yarn was giving me fits so some of that time was undoing the skein and making a ball of yarn.




Here are my supplies:
1 14" wreath form (I would probably like a 16 inch one, but apparently they are hard to find!)
1 skein of yarn - I probably used about 2/3 of it
1 bouquet of silk flowers and other embellishments

Tools needed:
scissors
glue gun
wire cutters (for cutting ends of silk flowers)
clear tape



You want to start by tying your yarn on to the wreath.  I left about a 6 inch tail on the yarn for the hanger at the end.  This is more than you need, but will make it easy to tie.  I would also recommend tying in at the seam of the wreath form (not shown in this picture) as when you tighten up your wrapping it won't keep moving around.

Now the wrapping begins.  If your wreath form is smooth like mine you can wrap the yarn several times and then tighten it up.  However, I wouldn't recommend that you get the wraps far apart and that you push them together every 4 wraps.

Also, when you tighten up your wraps DO NOT twist your hands.  You want to push and pull them together, but twisting will cause some of the wraps to loosen and some of them to tighten creating nonuniform wrapping.


 
If you need to take a coffee break use a couple of pieces of the clear tape to secure it down.  You may also want to tape down the tail that you left at the beginning so that it doesn't get in your way.









After many many many wraps you will get close to the end.  When you are about 3/4 of an inch or 1 inch from the end you can make your hanger.  Tape the tail down, tie it to the wrapped yarn and then finish wrapping over the taped section.









When you get all the way around you can tie the two ends together like this to form a little hanger.

Now your wreath is done and you can put your flowers on!

You will want to trim your flowers, but leave some of the stem to push into your wreath.  For the larger stems I leave about 1/2 to 3/4 inch, for the small wires I leave 1 to 1 1/2 inches.

Next you will want to dry fit all of your flowers.  I generally put all of the flowers in until I decide on the final arrangement.  Please note that the holes will not look this large.  Apparently my camera did not take the pictures the other day so I had to remove one after it was glued to show these pictures.

Once you have decided on the placement of all of the flowers use your glue gun to secure them in place.  Take the flower out, inject hot glue into the hole, and then replace the flower before the glue cools. 

I recommend removing and gluing one flower at a time.





An alternative to the hanger that I showed you is to use a wide ribbon. I will be adding a ribbon when I get some that coordinates with the flowers.