Are you ready for spring?

I don’t mind the winter, as long as there is snow and it’s pretty! Sometimes the pretty is just the trees’ silhouette outline on a colorful sky, since we haven’t had as much snow this winter. There have been a lot of gray, wet days. It has me itching to bring back color, so the other day, I took down all the winter decorations at our art studio and started creating some spring ones. Let me show you how I came up with my foliage!

As the founder of a non profit art studio, we get a good amount of local craft donations from other artists or businesses in town. Recently, we got some fabric samples from a home designer and it got me thinking if I could turn those into some inexpensive green, spring foliage.

I loved how there were different patterns, texture of fabrics and shades of colors. I started by cutting about 3″ long leaves. I didn’t measure or worry about the exact width or shape. This is a great activity to do during a movie or couch lounging one night.

Once I had a huge stack of leaves, I simply started hot gluing and folding them around some wire stems.

You can use whatever wire you have or you can pick some up in the craft floral section at your local craft store like I did. I added a dab of hot glue on the wire and kind of folded one end of the leaf around it. I don’t have any pictures of this step, but if you look closely you can see what I am saying.

I worked in about 3′ long pieces of wire and made a stack of this foliage as I went. I made 8 separate pieces, but you could make as many as you wanted. I intended for my foliage to hang like a garland, but you could create yours on dowel rods for a sturdy base to stick in a vase as well. There are lots of possibilities!

I love how the fabric creates a soft leaf and foliage look. It really makes it more believable by how it moves and does not have a harsh fold. I took my foliage to the studio and hung it down in our faux fireplace.

I love the natural, yet creative pop of inspiration it gives in the space.

It was a perfect way to add some spring decorations in an inexpensive way to our space. What do you think?

So, are you ready for spring? Or, do you want to will it into existence by creating spring looks too?

Creating doesn’t have to be expensive. Use what you have. If you have some old green Christmas decorations, you can cut that up for some leaves. Do you have some green shirts with a stain? You can use that too! On those little leaves, you can’t tell where they came from or what they use to be. When they are all strung up together though, they create a beautiful look!

Have fun and imagine the possibilities! If you create some inexpensive foliage, tag us on Instagram or Facebook so we can see!