Thanksgiving Wreath Welcomes Guests with Seasonal Flair
It’s always nice to be greeted at the entrance of a home with seasonal evidence of the warmth and good times to be enjoyed inside. That’s especially true at Thanksgiving.
Though sometimes, it seems as if the “creative” gene bypassed me completely, occasionally I am struck by an idea for a simple craft project, and my enthusiasm carries me through the process of completion. This Thanksgiving wreath is one of those inspirations; and, to my mind, it’s worth passing on.
Put together from simple “ingredients” inspired by a weekend visit to a local farmers market, the basic idea grew out of browsing through design magazines, Pinterest Boards, and those retail catalogs with gorgeous (and expensive) offerings. Once I gathered the materials, and pictured the door hanging in my mind, actual assembly took less than 30 minutes.
The finished product is pleasing, colorful, seasonally appropriate, and invariably prompts smiles and comments from visitors. In trying to be innovative, I freely grabbed inspiration from an assortment of wreath possibilities on bhg.com. You can select your favorites, just as I did.
Get Ideas, then Gather Materials
To do your own, you will need:
- Some kind of shallow metal basket – mine is a tarnished, well-worn old silver bread basket, no longer suitable for the Thanksgiving dinner table
- An assortment of miniature pumpkins and a couple of oddly appealing gourds with unusual colors and shapes; designers say an odd number is better than an even count
- 2 or 3 pheasant feathers; or a branch of fall leaves; perhaps an ear of dried Indian corn
- Brown or green floral moss
- A hot glue gun and floral wire
- Burlap bow, with streamers
The mechanics of assembling this creation are basic. On a flat surface, simply arrange and rearrange your items until you have a pleasing configuration. Then, using the wire and hot glue, make sure everything is well-secured and will withstand the door’s opening and closing as well as any winds that may come its way.
This door decoration is different. Although it’s not a wreath in the traditional sense, I can envision that in someone else’s hands, it could become one – perhaps with a grapevine wreath base, or a wreath form of straw, or perhaps even Styrofoam wrapped in burlap.
The beauty of this creation, however, is its simplicity combined with the ease of completing it. The only costs: the bow and the produce.
