When the holiday catalogs began hitting my mailbox back in October (!), I eagerly poured through them looking for inspiration for my own holiday decor. One of my favorite selections was the Spruce Alphabet Wreath from Ballard Designs.

It wasn’t the wreath itself that I loved. In my opinion, it looks too tall and skinny, and I just couldn’t see paying $45 for it. I don’t think there’s enough heft in it to command enough attention for that price. ‘Cause I’m cheap. However, I was drawn to the idea of a letter wreath hung with a thick ribbon (the wreath in the catalog is hung with a yummy chocolate velvet ribbon).

I decided to make my own mini version of the letter wreaths to adorn my breakfast room chairs. In true Lindsay spirit, I found all of the supplies I needed at the Dollar Tree. Have I told you one just opened about a mile from my house? It’s dangerous, people.

What You’ll Need:

• Foam board – 1 sheet
• Wired garlands – I used six total, but the number you need will depend on your letter and the number of wreaths you make. This is the type I purchased:

• Wired ribbon – I used 3 rolls total, but again, it will depend on what you do with this project.
• X-Acto or utility knife
• Wire cutters
• Scissors
• Glue gun and glue sticks (depending on your letter)

I began by printing out a letter ‘B’ from my computer. I chose a basic sans serif font and made it roughly the size I wanted my finished mini wreaths to be. I traced that letter onto the foam board and cut out the letters with my utility knife. I cut out six letters for my six chairs.

Then, I cut a roughly 12 inch section from one of my garlands with the wire cutters. Starting from the back of the letter, I wrapped that section around part of my letter.

My letter looked like it had crazy professor eyebrows (you know the ones), so I just gave it a haircut, cutting as closely to the letter as possible. If you are smart (unlike me), you’ll hold it over a waste basket to collect the trimmings. I, on the other hand, now have a green shag rug on my craft room floor.

Keep cutting 12 inch sections, wrapping, and hair cutting. I recommend the 12 inch sections, because it’s much easier to work with than trying to wrap the entire 15 feet of garland.

If you break your letter, don’t worry. Just tape it or glue gun it back together. The wired garland will hide the break.

When you finish wrapping your letter, you’ll have a stunning wreath!

Just kidding. You’ll need to trim some more. And trim, and trim, and trim. Cut it as close as possible so that you can see the shape of the letter really well. If you are like me and are using a letter with “holes” in it, be sure you stick your scissors in there and really trim out that hole as best you can.

If you find that you have some of the foam peeking through, no worries. Cut a small section of garland (3 or 4 inches) and re-wrap that part of the letter. Don’t forget to trim the new section!

The last step is a simple one. Just thread a length of ribbon through a “hole” on your letter. If your letter has no “holes” and is not one you can hang well, like ‘S’ or ‘C,’ you can attach your ribbon with a glue gun on the back of the letter.

I hung one of my mini wreaths on the back of each of my breakfast room chairs by tying a bow on the top of the chair. I absolutely love the way it looks.

You could hang them just about anywhere – stair railings, lamps, or even on a nail in the wall. It would be pretty easy to make them in a larger version, too.

What do you think? Do you like the Ballard Designs wreath or the Lindsay Ballard Designs wreath better? You’ve been wondering what my ‘B’ monogram stands for, haven’t you?

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For even more easy holiday DIYs, hop on over to Centsational Girl. I have a fun tutorial over there today featuring sequins. Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle! Thanks for having me, Kate!

If you ever come across an old light fixture that needs a new purpose, go ahead and take him home with you. Any old fixture with exposed candelabra-style bulbs can beautifully and easily become a real candelabra.

A few weeks ago on a rare weekday trip to the ReStore, I found a fantastic old, chippy iron fixture and grabbed it immediately. I know you would have grabbed it, too (and possibly have taken it away from a Hipster couple while they had their backs turned, as I did). It reminds me of an old cathedral.

There was no glass in the fixture, but if there was, I would have needed to remove it. You can also spray paint the fixture a different color if you are dealing with something that is, say, bright gold.

So, I just started by removing all of the electrical elements and innards. And by removing, I mean just unscrewing the lightbulb holder thingy-ma-jigs and cutting the wires with wire cutters. There’s no need to get fancy.

Then, after cleaning the fixture with a soapy water solution, I epoxied a short, thick roofing nail to each arm. I stuffed a tiny piece of paper towel into the old screw holes so that the epoxy wouldn’t drip too far down inside the arm. Epoxy takes about 24 hours to fully set, so super glue may have been a better adhesive to use. Live and learn.

I wanted to make my candelabra look as authentic as possible, so I found some metal couplings in the plumbing fixture section of Home Depot (mine are 3/4 inch wide if you go looking for them) to use as faux candle holders. After testing to make sure my candles would fit inside of them, I primed them with spray primer and then mixed up some acrylic craft paints to get a shade as close to the rest of the fixture as possible. I gave each primed coupling a couple of coats of paint.

After the epoxy was dry, I tried to stick my white taper candles on top of them. Unfortunately, I broke a candle doing that because they were too hard to slide on. So, my genius husband came up with the idea of drilling a hole in the bottom of the candles.

We drilled holes the same size as the nails into the end of the candles and then used the extra shavings to pack the holes so they would hold tight onto the nails. The candles then slid on easily. Just be sure to drill your holes straight! If your candles are too tall, you can also cut a piece off of the bottom with a knife and cutting board.

Once the candles were on the nails, I slid a painted metal coupling over each one.

Now, my new candelabra is ready to join it’s friend, the homeless PB Knock-Off Mirror, at the blue-walled alcove in my entryway. Honestly, I have a plan for that alcove, but I’m missing a vital component – the piece of furniture it’s all going to sit on. Regardless, don’t you love the mirror and candelabra together?

Am I the only one who puts together vignettes before I have the furniture that they are actually going to be put on? Yeah, I probably am. Have no fear, as it will all eventually come together.

It’s difficult to tell from the photos how imperfect and rusty it is, but just trust me. It’s perfectly imperfect.

I am so pleased to have given this forgotten beauty a new purpose, and I’m even more happy that it came out looking just like something that would have cost me $100 at an antique store. That old, chippy light fixture just lights my fire.