Adventures in Diaper Wreaths

I love an excuse to be crafty and make things. My sister-in-law's baby shower is this weekend, and I am bringing decorations. So, I decided to make diaper wreaths! I had the "brilliant" idea to make a guitar-shaped diaper wreath, but it just didn't turn out as planned. When I hung different little gifts on it, they concealed the shape of the wreath. It looked like a weird, hanging blob. So, I made a regular diaper wreath as well and hung all the little goodies on that one!

I'll start with the round diaper wreath. I based mine from a tutorial from Homemade Gifts Made Easy. I changed a few of the steps based on what I had at home.

1) I used a large dinner plate to measure out a circle on a piece of cardboard I had on hand (from a large shipping box). I made a large circle around that so I could cut out a ring.

2) I used a wire hanger on the back of the ring, which I thought made it sturdier and easier to hang. I used packing tape to secure it.

                                   

3) I used wrapping paper I had on hand to wrap the cardboard and hanger. You can see how I cut strips to be able to wrap along the curve.

4) I followed the instructions from the tutorial on hot gluing the ribbon around the diapers and securing each one to the wrapped cardboard ring.

5) I criss-crossed some thin green ribbon around the diapers, and then I tied some little toys and gifts to the diaper wreath. I finished it off with a big bow on top. I love the way it turned out!

To make the guitar-shaped diaper wreath, I began by shaping a wire hanger into the shape of a guitar.

I started out by folding the diapers around the frame, but I lost the shape of the guitar:

So, I tried a different method and actually wrapped the diapers around the wire frame. I wrapped twine around as I went in order to hold the diapers in place. 

Here's what it looked like when I finished wrapping the diapers around:

I worried it didn't look distinctly like a guitar. I ended up sewing some tan-colored construction paper onto the frame using twine. I printed out a picture of the bridge of the guitar and glued at onto the front, along with a black circle for the hole in the guitar. This is what it looked like from the back as I worked:

I made a little striped sweater and rolled that up to kind of look like the neck of the guitar. I secured it with a bow. Voila! I was just happy it looked like a guitar when I was done!

Diaper Wreath & Knit Booties

I spotted a cute "diaper wreath" on Pinterest, but it was only available for ordering. Since I had leftover diapers from the diaper cake, I wanted to make one myself. Here's how I did it:

Step 1: Take a wire hanger and bent it into the shape of a wreath.

Step 2: I took an extra receiving cloth that I had (also leftover from the diaper cake), folded in half into a triangle, and then rolled it up around the hanger to give it padding. You could tightly roll diapers around the wreath for padding if you'd prefer.

Step 3: Open each diaper and insert the wreath into the opening. Secure the top of each diaper with a rubber band, like so:

Here's what mine looked like after tying on each diaper. I used nineteen size 1 diapers.

Step 4: Tie ribbon over each rubber band and curl it. I think the orange ribbon on the original pin was very cute, but I only had baby colors available.

Step 5: Using extra ribbon, tie on any extra goodies you want to include on your wreath. I included some outlet safety covers, two pairs of booties that I made, a teething toy, a pacifier, and some hair bows.

Here are close-ups of the booties I made (also a Pinterest find, which you can view here).