January Wreath and Door ideas

I'm always a bit sad when I take down my outdoor Christmas decorations.  But when January hits, I know its time to pack it all up for storage. But I just can't seem to let my front door be naked. January is such a gray, sort of blahhh month so I want to still have something a bit cheerful on my front door.  I fell for this Anthropologie wool pom-pom wreath.  I went to see it in person in the store and as my friend, Jen, put it, "it looks like a dirty sheep".  It was cute, but looked more dirty than fluffy and for $128 I knew I was going to pass. In the pic above it looks lovely.  In the picture below you get the sort of dirty, been kicked around the barn look that it has in person and I wasn't about to spend that much on something dingy. (I can see that the dirty sheep look gave it character but it was really greige and not a nice fluffy cream or white).

Anthropologie Pom-Pom wreath looking sort of dirty-sheepish to me

And I'd prefer a brighter white or even cream.... So I went about making my own with a soft, white chenille.
I found another blogger who had the same exact idea...who was copying the Anthropologie wreath! She gives a great tutorial on an easy pom pom making technique.

My front door with my new handmade wreath!

I started by seeing what sort of wreath form I had kicking around.  I had an old grapevine wreath.  My plan B was going to be cutting a wreath shape out of cardboard.  Then I went about making pom poms out of the 3 rolls of white chenille that I had.  (Wool will give your pom pom a more stiff, defined pom...but I had this chenille and used it. It is super soft and a bit flopsy, but that's ok)! If you need a review on making pom poms check this out.  I am sort of a 'wing it' kind of girl. I don't use any fancy pom pom making device, I just  grab a piece of cardboard, count how many times I'm looping my yarn around it. Pull out the cardboard and tie a string around it making a sort of donut. Then I start to cut the loops and give the ball a haircut! I used a glue gun to attach my poms. My wreath took about 40 pom poms. 

The perfect, perky greeting on my door step for January.

If pom poms aren't your thing, here are a few other quirky ideas to celebrate winter after the holidays.

It's a fun time of year to cozy up to your glue gun!
 XXXOOO.