Cut Off in the Keweenaw: Window Wreaths

Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Window Wreaths

I've dreamed about having a house where I could have a wreath at every window, and the dream has come true. Exterior window wreaths wouldn't be practical for us for a couple of reasons. First, we're out in the middle of the woods, and people can't even see our Christmas decorations from the road. Secondly, with the amount of snow we normally receive (250+ inches!), outdoor wreaths would take quite a beating and would most likely be covered in snow rather quickly. I can, however, put a wreath on the inside of every window - or most of our windows - not the trapezoids.

Since I've been decorating this house in my head for many years, I was excited to see some plain artificial wreaths on clearance after Christmas 2 years ago at Walmart. (This same wreath is now selling for $2.99 - still not a bad price.)

I snapped up every one they had left that day for 50¢ each!

They've been packed away until now and were pretty smashed, so they required a bit of fluffing to make them look a little more natural.

Half smashed & half fluffed.

Fully fluffed.

These are wreaths I plan to use for many years, but I may want to change the look every few years. I decided I wanted to start with something simple - not fussy. I purchased some wide burlap ribbon at Walmart and some large jingle bell ornaments at Dollar Tree.

Simple & rustic.

I simply threaded the twine hanger (already attached to the jingle bell ornament) through the burlap ribbon. . .

threaded the burlap ribbon through the wreath. . . and then used a thumbtack to attach the burlap ribbon to the top edge of the window casing.

I trimmed the ends of the burlap ribbon and let it drape over the thumbtack and down in front of the window casing.

It took longer to fluff the wreath than it did to cut the burlap ribbon and hang the wreath. Some of the burlap ribbon had to be cut in longer pieces - depending on the size of the window.