Autumn Wreath Making

For the last three years I’ve been saying I’m going to make a Christmas wreath and for the last three years, I’ve ran out of time and bought one.

This year I’m going to go crazy and make an autumn wreath AND a Christmas one (maybe…).

I began by looking on Pinterest for some ideas on making an autumn wreath and came across a few, but they all involved buying plastic imitation berries, leaves and flowers – why would I want to do that when I’m surrounded by the countryside and everything I need, I could probably find on the floor.

It definitely feels like autumn has arrived; the leaves are starting to turn, the sunsets are earlier and light up the sky as if it were on fire, the sloes have turned purple and the hedgerows are full of berries. So it’s a perfect time to go for a walk with the princess and scour the hedgerow to see what I could use for my wreath.

As it turns out, there’s plenty out there to be used! Fallen oak leaves, straw from the freshly ploughed fields, ivy from the tree, a snipping of berries from a laden tree and some hydrangeas from the garden.

I needed a base for my wreath, so I popped to Hobbycraft and bought one from there. They’ve got lovely rattan ones for only fiver, which could be used for an autumn or Christmas wreath. I’ve been chewing the handsome one’s ear off for the past few days about making this autumn wreath so he bought me a glue gun, which I was so excited about using, but unfortunately I didn’t need to use it for this wreath. Another time glue gun, another time.

I started by laying out all of my findings on the kitchen table and making some trips back and forth to the garden, to re-home the earwigs that I’d somehow managed to collect along the way.

I then began to weave the straw and ivy into the base.

And then placed the dried hydrangeas and berries on top of the wreath and re-arranged until I was happy with how it looked.

I did think I needed to use the glue gun, but actually all I needed was some florist wire and pliers.

Once you’re happy with the positioning of everything on your wreath, use your wire to secure this into place. I took snipping of wire, fastened them over the leaves, berries etc and then used the pliers to twist the wire tight on the underside of the wreath. And then all you need to do is fasten it to your door!

So easy, really pretty and I spent as much time clearing up the mess as I did making the actual wreath. Give it a go, you really can’t go wrong.

A x