Homemade shrub and flower wreath

With Christmas just around the corner you may be thinking that decorating the house is in order.

I'm not a huge fan of gold and red tinsel, shiney baubles and glittering angels, so my christmas decorations take on a little bit of a different form...

Here is something to keep you busy this weekend, especially if you are expecting visitors...

Homemade shrub and flower wreath

What you need

Heavy duty scissors

Florists twine, cut into 6 x 15cm lengths

Approx 7 pieces of 40-50cm shrub branches

10-15 flowers (if your shrub branches don't have any)

For my one i used bougainvillea that had flowered. Another shrub that would do the job really well is star jasmine. But go see what you have in your garden and look for something with thin, long leafy, branches.

Step 1:

Get the two longest branches, and over lap the stalkiest ends. Tie them together with a piece of flourists twine. 

Step 2:

With another branch, overlap the untied end of one of the starting branches, and tie these together with twine. Kept repeating this process making sure you are not making your wreath too big. I aimed for a 40cm diameter, but you can make it bigger or smaller depending on the size of your door.

Step 3:

Once you have a full circle of branches (i used four to get my circle), take the remaining branches and twist them around the circle of branches to thicken the wreath out. Use twine to tie the shrubs where they look they are arent supported enough by just tucking them in. Position the flowers so colour is dispersed evenly amongst the green. If any flowers fall off, just tuck them into the branches.

Step 4:

Take a piece of twine and tie a loop at the top of your wreath - this is what it can hang off. My door didn't have anything for me to hang my wreath on, so i put a sewing pin 'nail' in the door, which won't leave a big hole.
 

Step 5:

Spray the wreath with a mist of cold water and hang.

Remember, the wreath is made from fresh plants so will die after a couple of days. Lucky, it's a super easy DIY, so if you have friends coming over you can just make another one.

With a bougainvillea, the leaves and flowers dry so you can leave it up and eventually get a dried arrangement! With mine, i have added fresh branches to my dried wreath to thicken it out as it dries out.