Pine Cone Wreath for Thanksgiving

I’ve admired pine cone wreaths for a while and finally decided to take the time to make one. It was easy to put together and I only ran into one tricky part with the placement of the inner circle of cones.  Since the low country of South Carolina doesn’t have an abundance of pine trees that drop tons of cones, I went a different route and bought 2 bags of cinnamon scented pine cones at a craft store. That did save time on cleaning them. 

I used most of two bags that I purchased at JoAnn’s. They were on sale, along with the stems, ribbons, and the thankful sign. I had the wreath form on hand, so the total cost for the wreath was about $10.

One word of caution: Be careful with with the hot glue for this project. All of the cones are glued to the wreath and have to be positioned just so. I was not as careful as I should have been! Start by adding hot glue to the wreath form and pressing the cone into the glue. It does take a little while to complete this because you’ll want to hold each cone in place for about 30 seconds. For a few of the cones, I needed to secure them with a piece of clear fishing line. 

Continuing securing the pine cones around the outer side of the wreath form with the tips of the cones pointing outward. 

I needed something to go into the center of the wreath form and since I often toss items into my craft supply that I think I might find a use for, I found two cardboard circles that came from frozen pizzas. It would have been easier if I had one piece that fit the entire circle, but I didn’t, so I just overlapped these two. Even though they don’t fill the circle, there was enough space to glue the cones on.  I glued the two circles together and then glued them to the wreath form. 

I tried gluing the inner circle of cones by adding glue to the bottom of them. It didn’t work. I glued a small piece of felt to the bottoms and then glued that to the cardboard. That worked much better.

Complete the inner circle by adding cones around it. 

To cover the cardboard, I glued an assortment of leaves.

I used the small berry picks and acorn picks as filler for any empty spots. A small garland is added around the cones. Some of the picks needed to be glued in place, others could be wedged in. 

There are quite a few ways to make a bow. The way I made this one is simple. It has several steps, but it comes together quickly. 

Use wired ribbon.
Cut several pieces of ribbon into various lengths. 1 extra long, 2 long, 2 medium, 2 small, and 1 very small (not all are in picture 2)
Fold the pieces in half, allowing just a little overlap.
Staple through both sides.
Fold the two longest strips in half and twist them into a V shape.
Staple them together.
Use hot glue to add the remaining pieces
Add one of the medium strips vertically.
Add the second medium strip horizontally.
Add one small strip at an angle.
Add the last small strip at an opposite angle. 
Staple the very small strip into a circle and add it to the center of the bow with a dot of glue.
Fold the extra long strip in the center. Pinch the center fold and staple it together. 
Add it to the back of the bow with hot glue.

I painted the thankful sign using paint I had on hand. It’s Waverly in Rhubarb. Before adding the bow to the wreath, I took it outside and sprayed it with a coat of Krylon Clear Sealer. Hopefully this will protect the sign and the berry picks from the rain. 

I added a white berry pick that I found in my craft stash and looped the sign over the stem to hang at an angle.

Gluing the pine cones took about 30 minutes plus the times I had to pause to run cool water over my fingers! Putting the rest of it together only took a little while longer. Now that Halloween is over, this will be hanging on our front door until it’s time for Christmas decor.

 

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Pine Cone Wreath for Thanksgiving

 

We’ll be sharing at lots of these great parties!