'MERICA!

In spirit of America's upcoming birthday I decided to made a 4th of July wreath. It's super easy and probably only took about 30 minutes to make while Jon and I watched TV. I used deco mesh to make the fluffy wreath part and then added the stars and flag bow after an impulse purchase at Michael's. The red and blue deco mesh ribbon is from Hobby Lobby.

The whole thing probably cost about $12 to make. I already had the white ribbon and the wreath frame. You can get them at any craft store but I recommend Hobby Lobby because they always have a good selection of colors.

First I grabbed the white ribbon and attached it to the wreath frame. To start you bunch up the end and secure it to the frame. This frame came with silver pipe cleaner-ish things attached in multiple places around the frame to hold the ribbon in place, but in the past I've used ornament hooks or any easily bendable metal. Then you just make a pouf (kinda like Snooki would do) and, once you like the size of it, secure it with the wire thing.

I wish I could explain better but here's a video from Better By The Bite to show you what I mean. I didn't follow this tutorial (I do what I want, there's no wrong way in crafting!) but I think she does a really good job of showing how to attach the deco mesh to the wreath frame. And her wreaths are super cute. I started to take photos but stopped because they're not really that helpful (can you even tell what I'm doing?) and I was in the crafting zone.

For the white ribbon, I attached it in a zig zag fashion until I hit all the pipe cleaners. I twisted the wires, securing the ribbon but still leaving some extra wire exposed to attach the red and blue ribbons on top. You could skip some of the pipe cleaners to leave it for a different ribbon but I wanted to add lots of white since it makes the wreath look fuller and provides a good background for the other colors.

Then I grabbed the blue ribbon and attached it on top where I started with the white. This time I jumped around to every other wire to leave room for the red. Once I was done with a pipe cleaner I made sure to twist it really tight around the deco mesh and the wreath frame so it didn't slip off.

When it was time for the red ribbon I just used the wires that didn't have any blue ribbon attached to them. I also made sure that the ribbons all looked good together and weren't crushing the other colors so it didn't look flat.

At this point I thought I was all done, sent a picture to my mom and hung it outside.

But the next day I went to Michael's (for a totally unrelated crafting errand) and I saw an American flag bow as soon as I walked in. Immediately I knew it would look good in the center of the wreath and it was only $3! Next to it were red, blue and silver stars picks. Those are picks that are usually placed into floral arrangements. I grabbed one in each color. I think they were each $1.29? I wish I had taken a photo before I added them to the wreath but I totally spaced. Blame it on my crafting high.

Back home (where Jon was probably wondering what took me so long) I secured the bow by safety pinning the top two corners on either side to the wreath.

I placed the stars around it and tightly wound the pliable metal base around the wreath frame. Then I moved the bunched stars around until I like the way it looked.

Then I showed Jon, sent a picture to my mom and hung it outside.

Happy Birthday America!