Southern Burlap Wreath

So, I know it's been a while since my last post. I kinda let myself get caught up in life. I haven't been doing a whole lot of creating lately. Just a few burp cloth embelishments and personalizations and paci clips for baby shower gifts. And I'm close to finishing a dress I made for myself. All that is left is the zipper. Other than that, not a lot has been happening. Oh, there was that t-shirt quilt I'd had for 3 years that I finally finished and was able to deliver to my friend :) Yes. 3 years

Greenville has this fantastic Saturday Market downtown on Main Street during the Spring, Summer, and Fall. I hadn't been since they opened up the first of May, and decided to meet a few friends there. This particular Saturday was Touch-A-Truck day where kids could come and touch a variety of trucks from the city, and other companies. Basically it was every little boy's dream come true. The market was CRAWLING with people because of this! It was great to see so much traffic downtown. Saturdays like this past Saturday make me really miss living downtown, but it's wonderful to have friends who do live downtown so that we can go to the market together! 

I'm a total lookey-loo when it comes to the market. For me, half of it is the experience. The way I shop at the market, is I start at one end and walk all the way to the other end just LOOKING and comparing prices on things. On my walk back up is when I like to make my purchases. I didn't have anything in particular in mind when I arrived except for strawberries. They were sold out by the time I got there. Oh well. I was able to get some delicious pasta, some pimento cheese, and some turnips.YUM!

After our trip to the market, we decided to work on some pinterest projects. You know. Those are the ones that you pin and say, "I'm going to do that someday." Well this was "someday" and we were going to tackle a few. On the list for today was laundry detergent, vanilla extract, and a wreath. When I got there, I realized that hadn't gone to the store to get the laundry soap bars. So, on to the vanilla extract. When I went to open my vanilla beans, I saw that there was MOLD growing on my vanilla beans that I had just purchased and were a vacuum sealed pouch! I've contacted the store I purchased it from and they are sending me a replacement pouch of vanilla beans. Talk about excellent customer service :) So the only project that was done that day was the gorgeous burlap wreath that my friend SB made!

I didn't think to blog about this until after she'd already started the wreath, but here are the supplies she used:

• straw wreath form
• burlap "ribbon" the comes on a spool
• jute
• felt accessories
• hot glue

First, she wrapped her wreath form in the burlap, overlapping with each rotation.

Here is where the burlap ended. She decided to hot glue the end of it down.

You can kind of see where the hot glue is up underneath the top layer of the burlap.

After gluing the end down, she wrapped the jute around the wreath, further securing the burlap and preventing fraying. This was such a subtle detail that almost gets lost in the burlap, but i really like it because it gives the wreath some visual interest while serving a practical need.

After she wrapped the whole end piece of the burlap with the jute, she tied it off on the back and hot glued the ends down to prevent any fraying.

SB found this really cool felt "S" on the clearance rack! It is really thick and sturdy and looks like it will be able to hold up to the summer heat and weather pretty well. I LOVE that pink color! She hot glued the S on the wreath right at the top of the jute.

She also found these felt circle rosettes on the clearance rack! They had these great alligator clips on the back of them, so she didn't even need to glue them in. That would be especially handy when she wants to re-use them. I like the two shades of pink in them, and they match the "S" perfectly.

To complete her wreath, SB added a bow that was made with the same spool of burlap that was used to wrap the wreath form. It is difficult to see in this picture, but the center of the bow is jute that is wrapped around several times, tied off, and hot glued. The ends of the bow were cut even with each other and the bow was glued to the top of the wreath.

Here is the finished product! Isn't it precious?! I absolutely love it. It just screams the South in the Summertime! Thanks SB for letting me post this!