Holiday Yarn Wreath

Like I said in my previous post, there are so many different ways to make a Christmas wreath.
Because I was SO worried about whether my friend would like the wreath I sent to her, I decided to make her an 'indoor' wreath - maybe I thought of it as a consolation prize or a gift with purchase.  I'm not sure but I just knew that I wanted to make this yarn wreath and send it to her.

My inspiration was this yarn wreath - it was labeled a 'different' kind of wreath.  I was so attracted to it, I just knew I had to make it.

A different kind of Christmas Wreath

Here were the easy parts of assembling the supplies for this wreath:

• white, green (dark and light), red felt? - check
• yarn that looks like twine? - check
• green and white yarn for accent? - check
• hot glue gun and fabric glue? - check

So what was left, you ask?  The wreath form, of course.  And if you go into Michael's or Jo-Ann's (the two closest craft stores to me), you will see that the only 'fat' wreath form are the straw ones.  I could have sworn I've seen fat Styrofoam wreath forms but sadly, it must have been my imagination because there were none to be found. I even asked my sister to run to Hobby Lobby to see if they had it - negative.  So she said the thing that I was hoping to avoid...maybe we just have to use the straw ones and keep the plastic wrap over it. 
And that is exactly what we did.  We each took a straw wreath, didn't mess with the plastic cover, and just started wrapping our yarn over it.  This was INFINITELY harder and more time consuming than wrapping a Styrofoam wreath because every wrapped piece of yarn had to be exactly in place - not like your Styrofoam ones where you can wrap, wrap, wrap a few times and then slide them neatly in place. I think I developed arthritis while wrapping my wreath. And it took more than a couple of hours to complete.
BUT once we had our wreaths wrapped, we went to work on the felt flowers.  I had NEVER EVER made felt flowers and for some reason, the thought of doing it was so daunting to me. Thankfully, my sister has made felt flowers before and with her help and this tutorial (Rosette Tutorial), I got the hang of it. 
We made three different size florets/rosettes.  To expedite the whole process, I would double up on the felt and cut out two circles at a time...that's where it all starts - circle shapes.  I would say ours ranged in size from 4-inch diameters to 8-inch diameters.  Once all your different colored and sized flowers are done and glued, I would place them out nicely on the wreath and then hot glue them onto the wreath to make it permanent.

This was my final product:

I added little floral rhinestones to the center of the flowers....I cut them down to be able to fit into the center of each floret.  And if necessary, I would glue them in.

I'm really happy with the way it turned out.  I've already started a similar one, using a Styrofoam wreath, and will use felt poinsettias instead (BHG poinsettias).

Happy Crafting!