Shag Wreath

So I have to admit, I tried a few different crafts today. The first one didn't turn out as planned. So, I chose to move onto the next one. At 11:30pm. Here my husband and I sit, watching criminal minds, and I break out the sewing machine. My husband very patiently asks me what I'm doing with the sewing machine at this hour. I felt guilty for interrupting his quiet T.V. watching time, and decided that I was going to try to find a way to do this thing without using the machine. And so I did. And as it turns out, I like it even more than I like the tutorial, which you can find http://sunshinemamasite.blogspot.com/2010/04/ruffle-wreath-tutorial.html:

So yes, I changed it up. I have learned as I have been updating this blog, that I am not good at explaining how I craft. So I will do my absolute best....

For the interchangeable flower, I used 4 different ribbon colors. I used one as the base color and paired it with one other color for each layer. I did purple and pink, then purple and blue, then purple and a darker purple. All I did to create the flower was create a loop, then glue it to itself, loop again, then glue it to itself. And I apologize that I have not done well in taking pictures of each step, I will get better, I promise. At the end, I hot-glued a pin to the back so that I can change out the flower according to the season.

For the wreath, I purchased a $1.99 wooden, blank wreath, from Michaels. I had some heavy-weight fabric left over from some valences that I made a few months ago. The tutorial that I got the idea from used a ruffling techinque. I had a hard time replicating that technique, and Andrew wasn't having the sewing machine thing at midnight tonight, so I just cut my fabric into strips, then ran my hand along the cut edges to fray the edges. This created a really cute effect on the material once the wreath was done.

My first step with the wreath was to wrap fabric strips around the base of the wreath, as seen on the tutorial. I hot-glued pretty much every time around. Then I covered the wreath with my strips. I applied a line of glue, then would scrunch the strip and place it on. I did it by row. I did about 5 rows. By the time I was done, it was pretty frayed and looking super-duper cute! Even my husband loved it. And he's pretty hard to please as far as crafts go.