Every fall my mother would make a wreath like this one, and this year, I decided to make one of my own! It was easy to make, and extremely cheap!!
How to make it:
1. Get a plain wreath of any size you want - I got mine for $4.99 at Michael's. You want to get a wreath made of a material like this, because you are going to be weaving the berries into it.
2. Find some Bittersweet berries!! This is easy, I swear. They are found all over North America in the fall time. I find mine in the industrial areas in the town I grew up in, but that's only because that's where my mom took me as a kid to look for them. You can find them in any sort of area that's not a city, basically. They grow on the edges of the woods, so they are easy to get to.
This is what you're looking for:
Just bring some scissors with you because if the branches are still healthy, they are pretty hard to break with your hands.
3. Now that you have a nice little collection of Bittersweet branches,
you want to start cutting off the smaller branches that stick out, from the main thicker branch in the middle. Also, remove all of the leaves and start making a pile of the smaller, berried branches
4. Now it's time to start weaving the branches into the wreath! Since the wreath I used was made out of branches, itself, I just kind of stuck both end of the berried branch into the wreath. Wrapping the berried branches around the branches in the wreath also helped to hold them in place.
5. Keep going....
6. until you have made it as full and robust as you'd like!!
7. Hang up your wreath anddd..... Voila!!! When you wake up the next morning, the shells around the berries will have burst open, and your wreath will now look like this!
I love the bright orange of Bittersweet berries! A word of warning though, since these are a live plant, they are dying. The yellow shells around the berries get very dry and brittle and fall off. When I was younger, my mom always hung this on our front door, and every time the door was opened and shut, the shells would fall off. I, however, have hung my wreath on a utility closet door in my apartment that is never opened. And, no shells have fallen off of it yet!! :)
Happy fall! :)
