Thrifty Art Thursday: How to make a String Wreath

Thrifty Art Thursday: How to make a String Wreath February 17, 2011

We’re approaching the mud Spring season, and with all the birds chirping and the grass peeking out from under the snow, I’ve been in the mood for pretty decorations. I also was given a grab bag of ribbons and string, a lot of it beautiful vintage stuff. So I decided to make something out of it all.
I had these three Chinet plates, the really sturdy paper ones. Since I only had three, I decided to make them wreaths. I cut out the centers, and saved the centers for later and the girls and I painted them up. The girls used watercolor, and I used homemade walnut husk ink.
I let the girls glue on ribbons with white glue while I experimented a little. I decided to make some wheat paste. I’ve been pondering how to make my own glues for a while. Often the most toxic part of a project is the glue so I’d like to learn a little more about making sticky bits for myself. Wheat glue is the simplest I’ve found to make so I gave that a shot.
Basically, you take wheat flour and water and mix it up until it’s smooth, with the consistency of pancake batter.
Then I gently heated it over the stove while I stirred, mostly constantly. There were a number of times when I had to go help the girls with ribbons and glue and the paste sat there. It seemed to survive the neglect. As you can see, it thickened up nicely.
Then my eldest and i smeared paste all over my wreath, and smashed my ribbons and string bits into the paste. I made a pretty thick layer with the paste, so that the string sank into the wreath. Then I let them all dry for a couple of days, just to make sure everything was really dry.
Here’s where I hung the wreath I made, along with a pastel sketch I made long ago, and one of my little shrines. That one is called Forest for the Trees.

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