Fall Ruffle Wreath

Hi Pocket Full of Pink readers!!  My name is Jenny and I blog at Days of Chalk and Chocolate!  It's my little slice of the blog world where I chronicle my days as a mother, crafter, DIYer, and sometimes teacher. I hope you'll come visit one day! I'm so excited to be a guest poster while Karen is off having fun.  Thank you, Karen for the opportunity!  I thought I would share my most popular post and one of my earliest in my blogging life:  my fall ruffle wreath!  I call it fall because I used cordoroy but really it can be any season!

Without further ado...

Ok, so  I promised this tutorial yesterday but it just didn't happen. Jim works from home 3 days a week and we only have one computer hooked up in the apartment which means from sun up to sun down I can't get on. And then my sister and I spent a ridiculous amount of time in Joanne's looking at fabric so I couldn't post in the evening. She is a knitter and she is working on a knitting exchange with some friends from Ravelry so she's always fun to hang out in Joanne's with. Plus she's the kind of friend that, instead of saying "No, you don't need that. Save your money. I know it's beautiful but you just don't need it," she says "Do it. I'll do it. If you do it I'll do it. You know you want to."  Love that about her!  

Anyway, I'm still learning how to put together a really good tutorial but I did my best and I hope it helps! 

Step 1:  Gather your materials.  You will need a wreath form (mine was 16 inches), 2 yards of fabric (I'm guessing because I had remnant fabric), glue gun, basic sewing tools, ribbons/fabric to make flowers. I made my flowers first. Here is a mini-tutorial on the twisted fabric roses.

• Heat up your glue gun. Pre-cut a cut felt circles the size you want your flower to be (approximately). Cut strips of the fabric. I like my strips to be about an inch wide.  Fold in half long ways and fold down one corner and hold it with your thumb like this.   (This picture is from a different project that, um, didn't work out. That's why it's black.)

• Twist the strip and and wrap around the starting "knot."  Continue twisting and wrapping, holding it all along with your thumb to keep the shape. Play with the tightness of the twist to achieve the look you want. I like to use a loose twist.

• Continue wrapping, twisting until you get to the end.  Use a dot of hot glue to secure the end to the bottom of the flower. Stick finger you got hot glue all over into a glass of ice water.

I have found that thicker, stiffer fabrics work the best. I tried organza and it was a glue gun catastrophe. I'm still reeling from it.

Ok back to the wreath. 

Step 2: Pre-make 22 ruffles. I used two different types of fabric: cotton and corduroy in the same color so 11 of each . I have a tutorial on making the ruffles here. I used lengths of fabric that were 18 inches to make my ruffles which was 2 1/2 times the width of my wreath form. You will have to measure your wreath form. Also I prefer looser ruffles. If you like tighter you will need to use longer lengths of fabric.

Step 3: Cut strips of fabric to wind around wreath as a base. Cover the enter wreath. I cut this step out because I had remnant fabric and didn't have enough to do that. DON'T SKIP IT! It isn't the same. sniff. 

Step 4: Begin gluing your ruffles. Lay the first ruffle face down on the table. Run a bead of hot glue on the ruffle. Lay your wreath form on top. Bring two sides of ruffle up and glue in place.

Step 5: Keep gluing in the same way, alternating fabrics, all the way around the wreath. This is clearly a one sided wreath, lol. It is not essential that you do your gluing on a Sesame Street place mat, by the way.

Step 6: When you have completely covered the wreath in ruffles, lay your flowers in the arrangement you want. Then glue your flowers to the ruffles.

All finished!

I hope you enjoyed my little throwback and thanks again to Karen for inviting me to join in the guest posting fun!  

Cheers!

Jenny