Red and white striped straw wreath

When I flew to Arizona last month for The Mister's Ironman race, the woman sitting behind me on the airplane was looking at the December Women's Day magazine with this cover, which caught my eye:

And then what I realized that the darling wreath was made of red and white striped straws, I practically snatched it out of her hands to get a closer look! Then I spent the rest of our vacation searching for a copy of the magazine of my own, but didn't find one until we were at the airport for our return flight to Colorado!

On Wednesday, even though the decorations weren't out, I still have loads of gifts to buy and the tree is laying in pieces in the front room, I decided I was making that darn wreath! I already had the straws, purchased by the gross from Orson Gygi this summer. I bought them in-store, but they are definitely the most economical source from whom to buy the straws that I've seen yet. They also carry blue and gray striped straws.

If you don't have the December Women's Day magazine, you can find the instructions for this wreath and 5 other cute wreaths here. I was able to find the 6" flat floral and craft ring at Michael's in the aisle with the other wreath forms and floral wires. I simply used a piece of white computer paper glued it onto the form with a glue stick. From there, I proceeded following the instructions as written.

When I got to the final ring, I very carefully applied just a small amount of glue to each straw before sticking it down. I wanted to make sure that no excess hot glue would squeeze out and show since it was the top layer, but for the previous two rings, I just put the glue down and then placed the straw on top of it.

It really was easy, and I love how cheery it turned out! It took me almost two hours to mark and cut all the straws, then glue them one at a time, but the time went quickly since I was catching up on the final two installments of "Downton Abbey."

And now I have a bowl of leftover straw bits to repurpose--you had better believe I'm not just throwing those away! I have some red beads and white yarn and I think I'll have Maren make a garland with those and the straw pieces.

This was such a fun project! I know those striped paper straws come in all sorts of colors, and you could make a wreath out of any of them--black and orange and gray for Halloween would be neat, pink for a baby or bridal shower, or rainbow colors would be really fun as well! And if you can't find the striped straws, check out this clever paper 'pixie stick' sunburst wreath at Sassy Style Redesign.