If you are going to go to the trouble of staining the front door - know in advance that it likely won't stop there. I think maybe I was spending too much time staring at the fruits of my labor because it started to look very, well, empty. I searched home décor sights for something, though I wasn't sure what. A few clicks at Pottery Barn gave me some ideas but the prices! Yikes!
(I spend money in time allotments now. I don't see dollars and cents. I see units of work. How many shifts is that pretty, somewhat fragile, organic, welcome wreath really worth to me, anyway? Yah. It just wasn't THAT awesome.)
I perused Etsy and I still couldn't do it for the price. The cheap ones were, well, CHEAP and the items I liked seemed to still be in the $100+ range.
So I cruised over Pinterest just to see if something - caught - my - eye... If you don't know Pinterest that likely won't make sense but for those of us that do, we know all too well that it can take you into an alter-universe where time simply disappears. One moment it's 8 pm and you are waiting for a commercial to end before your favorite TV show starts. You remember a recipe you saw the other night and take advantage of the break to look it up so you can pick up the ingredients in the morning. You look up, the house is dark, the TV is off. Everyone is asleep. It's 2 am and NO... You never did actually make it to the ingredients list of that recipe -- what was it anyway? And who will have time to cook! You need to get to bed because there are 13 super cool projects that you just found and must absolutely start working on first thing in the morning!!!
Ah, but I digress... This is about a wreath, right?
Yes, you can find tons of instructions on Pinterest. So many, in fact, that I'm not even posting the link. There are thousands.
Mine is made out of a straw wreath base and about 2 yards of burlap cut into 3.5-4.5 inch squares and hot glue gunned into place. I may have burned most of my fingertips past the nerve endings because eventually they quit hurting. I found a cardboard letter and wrapped it with twine, holding the twine in place with a fair amount of glue. (Also seen on Pinterest, of course.) Then I embellished it with a bandana and USA flag and called it good.
It took about 6 hours from start to finish and about another 4 days to get all the tiny burlap particles out of the house. It cost about $20 in the end and it discouraged me from starting any new projects for a few weeks -- and THAT likely makes it worth it's weight in gold.
