Choice of materials for the Christmas wreath

• If you have beautiful vegetation in good shapes, the more beautiful your wreath will be.
• Choose a generous moss, leaves in elegant forms, and varied shapes and sizes.
• Think of adding a couple elements much more lively to illuminate your creation.
• Stay in harmonious proportions: smaller things are harder to see, and larger objects could imbalance your wreath.
• Don't hesitate to collect everything that you find beautiful. Nature is creative, do as she does!

Prepare the materials for the Christmas wreath

• Certain elements found in nature must dry in a dry and well-ventilated place before being used.
• As a general rule, let your collection dry before starting. This will make sure that all insects and creepy-crawlies clear out before you make your wreath.
• Other materials, coming from the kitchen, require some preparation.
• Certain materials can be painted gold, to give the atmosphere of celebration (nuts, acorns...). The easiest method is to use spray paint.

• Moss
  • Dry the moss flat, well spread out, ideally on a grill, in a dry and airy space. If it is too dry, the moss will turn and have the tendancy to crumble; on the other side, if it is too cool, it could attract bugs.
  • Let dry for 1 week.

• Dead Leaves
  • Let them dry in a large book, between two pages of silk paper, to avoid staining the pages of the book.
  • Let dry for 1 week.

• Mushrooms 
  • Choose the most dense and compact mushrooms. Those that live on dead tree take on elegant formes, one dried.
  • Let dry for 1-2 weeks.

• Garlic peelings and red onions 
  • They look great when you use them as flowers, but also fragile and delicate to manipulate.
  • Let dry for a minimum of 2 weeks.

• Orange Slices
  • Sliced very thin, slices of the center of an oranges can perfume your wreath.
  • Let dry for about 1 week.

• Orange Zest 
  • To make a peel long and thin, peel the orange with a vegetable peeler.
  • Let dry for about 1 week.

Create the base of the Christmas wreath

• Place the moss on the wreath, covering well.

• Attach the moss by wrapping the wire around the wreath and moss.
• If you don't have enough of moss, attach some lichen and bark.
• If the wire sticks out in some places, you can camoflage it when attaching other elements.
• If you want to hang the wreath, think of making a hook, during this step, with the wire.

Create decorative elements for the Christmas wreath

• Take out all of the materials you collected to decorate your wreath.
• Take the time to place different materials on the wreath before attaching them, and judge the effect it creates.
• There isn't any order to place the items, but if you prefer, place larger elements before the smaller ones, and attach the most fragile pieces last.
• Several tips for attaching the material: 

  • Attach the elements directly to the moss or one of the others with a glue gun.

  • Prick some elements into the wreath that would stick out naturally (little branches, cedar flowers...)

  • Attach the following with toothpicks (pins work well too): orange peels and slices, nuts, thin bark...and camoflage the pins by gluing small decorative elements on top of them.  

Final Touches to the Christmas wreath

• Apply the spray varnish, in small sprays, to give a sheen to dry materials, but not too much; you don't want to make them look fake!

• The result appears fragile, but if the wreath is stored well in a box and preserved from shocks and light, it could last years!

Alternative ideas: