I love this time of year when the heat starts to dissipate and the crisp morning air takes your breath away. I love the warm colors of Fall, especially the orange and brown hues in nature. To me, there is nothing more beautiful than the vision of pumpkins and wreaths in all of the wonderful Fall colors adorning houses. A couple of weeks ago, my sister and I took the kids to a local farm, Kinsey Family Farm, to pick out pumpkins to decorate for Halloween. Being new to Georgia, I have no clue where to go to find the best things but I continue to venture out to find those amazing little hidden gems…any boy, did I strike gold with this one. This is a working farm with the most beautiful heirloom pumpkins that you can’t just find anywhere. They have a huge nursery and trees as far as the eye can see. There are so many things to do including feeding the animals, hay rides and the list goes on.

While we were there, I found the inspiration for my Fall and Winter wreaths and I have to say, they are so much more unique and beautiful than what you will find in the stores. I hope this inspires you to get out and spend a little time in nature, pick some pine cones and other found items and make some great pieces for yourself. On my treasure hunts at Lake Lanier, I also found great pieces of drift wood to use on upcoming projects including a “ZOMBIE CROSSING” sign for the yard. For now, I will just show off my new wreaths and tell you how easy they are to make.

SUPPLIES:

• pine cones of various sizes, from really small to large
• 12 inch straw wreath
• Spray Paint (optional)
• Large Glue Gun
• Glue Sticks
• Other filler like acorns, etc. (optional)

THE PROCESS:

Once you have all of your items, it is an easy, time-consuming process. You will need to heat up your glue sticks in the glue gun (you will go through a lot of glue during this process). If you are creating a multi-colored wreath, separate out your pine cones into how ever many colors you plan to use. I kept a lot of pine cones natural to mix in.Protect your floor with trash bags or a tarp and begin to spray your pine cones several times until you get the desired effect.

Once they are completely dry, you can begin to assemble your pine cone wreath. I began by situating larger pine cones onto the straw wreath first. You will want to make sure you use plenty of glue so they stick but try not to have too much showing. The wreath looks a little odd as you are starting so don’t get frustrated. Start filling in gaps with medium and smaller pine cones to your liking. This is a very free flow process so eyeball where you think looks best! As you begin to fill out your wreath, you will get a sense of shape and be able to modify as needed from there. It is very difficult to remove the cones once they are affixed and if it isn’t perfect, it will be perfect.

For my Fall wreath I used the following Krylon ColorMaster Spray Paint colors: Pumpkin Orange, Leather Brown, Burgundy and Bauhaus Gold. For the Winter wreath, I lightly sprayed with a white spray paint and placed acorns around the wreath. Both will be attached with a lovely ribbon when the time comes.

I hope you enjoy this project as much as I did. I made a trip back to Lake Lanier to get more pine cones to take for on a trip next week to make with a friend. Next up will be the zombie crossing sign…I bet you can’t wait! My inspiration for these comes from The Sawdust Girl.