These are a total idea steal from This Hand Painted Home – so if you actually want to buy the pro versions of these, check out their Etsy page. To discover how you can make some slightly less pro versions, read on!

So, I saw these on Instagram, and was inspired to try them out as a Christmas project for my friends at choir (shameless plug to check out Singularity West London Voices on Facebook if you’re chorally inclined). And whilst not quite as polished as the originals, they look really pretty!

Note – whilst this isn’t tricky, there is a lot of drying and waiting to do, so allow a bit of time to make these!

What you need:

• Wooden embroidery hoops – 10cm or 12cm work well (mine came from John Lewis’ haberdashery section)
• Printed sheet music for your favourite carols (normal paper is fine)
• Card – I used Hobbycraft Kraft Card
• Decoupage paper or paint (optional) to decorate the back of the card
• Teabags (as I’m married to a Yorkshireman, I’ll advocate for Yorkshire Gold. It makes no difference to the paper-staining.)
• Paint for the hoops – I already had some gold leaf paint, so I used this. Mine was C Roberson Liquid Metal from Cass Art
• Decoupage glue – I used Mod Podge Matt
• Artificial or real greenery (I took some small leaf stems off some flowers I had)
• String or ribbon

How it’s done:

• Paint your embroidery hoops on both sides – you’ll need to do this in two phases to let the first side dry before you do the second
• Cut out your sheet music and the card in a circle shape that’s marginally smaller than the outside of your hoop, but bigger than the inside ring
• Stick the sheet music circle onto the card circle
• Make a cup of tea, and take out the teabag (the tea is perfectly fit for drinking, hence the Yorkshire Gold recommendation). Squeeze out your teabag, and then dab it on your sheet music circle to create an ‘aged’ effect – you may remember doing this in primary school! Make sure the teabag isn’t too wet, or things could start getting soggy at this point
• Once your tea-stained music circle is dry, cover the front with a layer of Mod Podge, and press the embroidery hoop on top

• You may want to do a second round of Mod Podge on the front once dry. After this, you can turn your attentions to the back. If your card circle is nice and neat, you may want to leave as is – if so, just cover this in Mod Podge and let dry. Mine was not, so I made another (better) circle in decoupage paper, and stuck this on top before sealing with the glue. You could also use paint if you prefer
• While you’re waiting for this all to dry (I told you there was a lot of drying), you can prepare your leaves. If they’re artificial, skip this step – but if they’re real, just give them a coat of Mod Podge to seal them

• After everything’s dry, glue the leaves to the top of the ring, so that they fan out over the sides
• Then, take your string and tie it in a loop (big enough to hang) with c.10cm left hanging down on each side. If your embroidery hoop has something to attach to at the top, thread it through this). Tie the loose ends into a bow, and trim as needed. If you didn’t already loop the string through the hoop, just glue it on, with the ribbon covering the start of the greenery stems

And (after a final stint of drying), you’re done! There’s lots of scope to customise these to your own taste – different paint, quotes instead of sheet music, or other decorations on top – so let your creative side run wild. Or, just copy somebody else like I did.

Good luck, and send me any pictures if you try it yourself (I might just copy those too!)

Christmas wreaths can be pretty pricey to buy, but are super easy (and much cheaper) to make yourself. With zero experience in wreath-making (aside from theoretical skills acquired on Pinterest), I thought that it could only be so difficult…and unlike the mince pies that I tried to make on the same morning, it all worked out pretty well!

This is a great craft to do with a group of you – get the greenery and decorations laid out, open the prosecco (or pour the tea, depending on the time of day!) and crack on some Christmas music. If you weren’t feeling festive before, you will be now. And we did ours in November (oops)!

What you need:

• Variety of greenery – we went with ivy, fir, holly, and some miscellaneous evergreen bits (my tree knowledge is failing me here!) Depending on how DIY you’re feeling, you can either buy this in, or collect it yourself
• A wreath ring – options here are many – wire, foam, twine, moss. I went for moss-covered rings from John Lewis, as I thought that they’d help keep the greenery fresh for longer – Link to John Lewis moss wreaths

• Ribbon for hanging
• Glue gun – mine was from Hobbycraft

• Bits to decorate – I went to the garden centre in Wandsworth, and got pre-wired baubles and red berries, fir-cones, and dried orange slices

How it’s done:

1. Soak your moss rings in water earlier in the day, and then leave them to dry out bit – they should be damp (otherwise it’s hard to get the greenery in), but not soggy
2. Tie a length of ribbon around your wreath to hang (I went with about 50cm, then trimmed later) – it’s easier to do this now than when you have all of your greenery on the wreath. If you want to lie your wreath flat (e.g. as a centrepiece), then you don’t need to do this
3. Starting with your bigger bits of greenery (e.g. the fir), start adding to your wreath by pushing the stems into the moss ring. For best effect, angle your leaves at a slant, and make sure that they are all going in roughly the same direction
4. Once you’ve got basic coverage of your wreath with the bigger leaves, start adding in the smaller and spikier leaves, such as the holly and ivy
5. Attach any wired decorations in the same way, by pushing the wire into the moss ring
6. Finally, use your glue gun to secure any non-wired decorations onto the wreath

You’re then ready to hang your wreath!

If you’re not inspired yet, here are five that we made earlier…