Shamrock Wreath

Well we will be heading into March pretty soon and that means St. Patrick's Day! So I decided to get a jump on our projects while I had some free time. Today's post is a Shamrock Wreath. The kids can make this and take it home to hang on their doors! I still need to add the string for hanging but it is still drying.

Items needed:
1 large paper plate with the center cut out
brown paint
shamrocks in two different colors (we have a die cutting machine at work so I cheated!) I used 5 for this project
yellow construction paper (if not using foil)
glue
scissors

if using foil -
gold foil glued to any color paper
silver foil and color with yellow markers after gluing to paper
you can also use metallic paint in gold

Start by having the kids paint the entire backside of the plate in brown. (It's easier to glue everything on this side) Put off to the side and let to dry. We will have the kids paint this when they first get to class so we have time for it to dry before art.

I painted a thin layer of gel medium onto the paper (my glue bottle was mad at me so I had to improvise) and then I laid the gold foil on top. (My husband works at a printing company and brought this small roll home that was unusable by them) Run the side of your hand across to smooth it out and remove any air bubbles.

As you can see, because the paper is thin, it curls up when finished gluing. Lay the sheet face down and put something heavy on top to flatten it. After about five minutes, it is okay to start cutting. Using sharp scissors helps too. I used a spool of thread to trace the circles. Tracing on the backside makes it much easier to see when cutting. We don't have a die that small so it's by hand for me.

Here are some of the shamrocks made on the diecut machine. I think it is by AccuDie but not sure. Don't look too closely at the shamrocks as I didn't have the paper completely covered on the die and chopped off small pieces. I decided to use those for my class sample and let the kids use the nice ones. I am such a good person ;) Glue each one down, alternating between the two colors and overlapping slightly.

To finish this off, I glued gold circles (coins) around the wreath. I made a small black pot for the "pot o' gold" and glued a couple coins to the back. I then glued the pot onto the bottom of the wreath. To finish this off, I will hole punch at the top and run string through for hanging. Happy early St. Patrick's Day to you!