DIY Knitted Winter Wreath

I know wreaths are usually associated with Christmas, but I created this knitted winter wreath with an eye towards having one I could display all winter long. It's Christmas-appropriate but also perfect for displaying during the frosty, freezing winter doldrums when all you want to do is huddle under a million blankets and drink your weight in hot chocolate. (New England, I have such a love/hate affair with you!)

I'm going to give you a general outline, so that you can customize this to your taste. I'd advise using what you already have. It's a great scrap yarn project!

I had a thick (either Aran or Bulky weight, I believe) almost curly off-white yarn sitting around. I cast on varying amounts of stitches (I want to say 7 for the smaller one - aka the inner one shown above - and 10 for the larger one) on size 13 needles. Then I knit in i-cord until it was a length I was pleased with.

Now, since I used large needles, my i-cord is a bit hole-y/lace-y. I knew my stuffing would match the yarn pretty closely and only be noticeable close up, so this was intentional. Why cast on more stitches and make a tighter tube if it won't show? (Also known as, I was being lazy. I'm okay with that.)

Here's a close-up of my two i-cord tubes. For the rest of this tutorial, I'll be using the larger one. I decided I liked it better.

I had some polyfill laying around, so I used a long, straight knitting needle to pack it in. I wanted this to not sag when hung up, so I stuffed it pretty tightly. If you don't mind a little drooping, stuff it less. There's no right or wrong way! Then stitch the ends of your tube together. I chose to sort of graft them into one continuous tube, rather than closing both ends and then connecting them. You could do it either way, this one is just a bit faster.

Choose a ribbon, and either use a large needle (like a tapestry one) to pull it under a loop so it's secure when you tie a bow or make a bow and then hot glue it on.

Trim the ends to whatever length you like, and voila! I thought gold and white would be nice winter colors, but use what you have. You could do light blue and white, red and white, gray and white, ice blue and light gray, etc.

Here's my finished wreath! The whole thing took me less than two hours so you could whip one up in a day as well.