Pine Cone Wreath

 

Look what I made this weekend!

 

 

 

Can you believe it?  Someone has abducted Amy and has replaced her with some Martha Stewart rip-off.

See?  Even Scott could barely believe his eyes when I was using a hot glue gun and took a picture!

The best part about this wreath is that it was FREE.  Several weeks ago the girls gathered a huge bag of pine cones at my parents’ house and they’ve been sitting in garage since.  We keep talking about doing some crafts with them but for some reason Lexi balks every time I mention putting peanut butter and bird seed on them and that’s really all I’ve got in the pine cone-craft department.

So I’ve been wanting to change my wreath on the front porch for a while but with this whole budget thing it’s been hard to fork over cash for a wreath.  So after several googling sessions, I just decided to go for it.  My current wreath was one I bought from Wal-Mart probably 2 years ago.  It was a purple clustering of flowers.  Well, I just ripped the flowers off the styrofoam base.  I have to say, it was quite cathartic.  Then, I laid out pine cones around the wreath.   The smallest ones I fit around the middle and mid-sized ones for the middle and outer rows.  The largest pine cones didn’t work for this project.  I do hope to make some peanut butter bird feeders with Emma soon.

I started the wreath by hot gluing the smaller ones pointed towards the center.  The middle row I leaned the pine cones all clockwise, gluing on the bottom and sides.  The final outer row took a lot of hot glue but I pointed them all counter-clockwise, gluing again on the bottom and sides.     When I was done, I turned the wreath upside down and glued around the edges for extra hold.  I couldn’t believe how strong the hot glue held the cones though!

 

After the pine cones were done, we noticed the purple Styrofoam was still sticking out…note to self: spray paint foam before starting next time!  We went in the backyard and picked up some of those pesky acorns (sorry, squirrels!) and randomly hot glued those in the spots with the largest gaps.

My only cost was the bow I got at Michael’s for $1.19!   I thought I had bought some fall ribbon from the Dollar Store yesterday to match the gold bow but I could not find it in our bags.  Oh well.  If I get a chance to go back, I’ll pick some up.  Otherwise, it will be adorable with the red/gold leopard print Christmas ribbon I picked up at Michael’s for just a few dollars!