Most stereotypes about Russian people include living in a forest with bears strolling around with a bottle of vodka. Well... these stories don't make themselves up, do they? ;) For example, the walk from my bilding to the nearest forest literally takes me... 1 minute. There are lots of advantages to it: fresh air, a place to ride my mountain bike during summer, a place to go skiing during winter, but mostly I like it for the opportunity to go for long peacefull walks. My daughter is often there with me and as a 4-year old she is very curious. She loves to pick up sticks, leaves, pine cones, fir cones, larch cones, all other possible cones that come her way. She feels obliged to bring her loot home. And I feel obliged to do something with it. And I do...

Wreath with fruits of the fall

Traditionally, wreaths are made for Christmas, but I think they are great to welcome other seasons as well. It is also pretty easy to make one. All you need is to cut a ring of stiff cardboard (this one is about 15 inches in diameter and about 3 inches wide) and glue everything one can find in an autumn forest to it with the help of a glue gun. For my wreath I used pine cones, fircones, acorns, chestnuts, hazelnuts, walnuts, hips (I mean berries, not body part;)) and rowanberry. Couple of cinnamon sticks came in handy as well. 

Tips:

• Notice that I glued all the leaves and branches closer to the outer rim of the cardboard ring - this way they make a nice kinda fluffy halo and give to the arrangement a wild, natural look. 
• It is important to use dry leaves and branches, because they stick better and don't loose shape after a while. 
• Put all the elements closer together, so that one couldn't see the cardboard ring underneath.

Oak leaves compositions

These two were made out of sheer boredom - it was a rainy day and my daughter and I were sitting at home reading a book just as several dried leaves fell right out of it (we must have hidden them there to press-dry and totally forgot). I liked how well they were preserved! 

 

We took some pieces of fabric of camel, beige and greenish color and glued them with the help of glue gun to two pieces of stiff cardboard, then added the leaves and acorns. It looked nice, I liked how the colors of the fabric go with the color of the leaves, but it was missing something. Them my daughter chose those red buttons. They are a real relic, cause they come form a cardigan my mother knit some good 20 years ago. I liked this final touch :) We hung these pictures in the hall of our building - some cover the walls with graffiti, and we do this :) 

Autumn box

This would be the amount of pinecones we usually bring home from every walk in the forest. Instead of just putting them away in some box... I put them in a box.

You take a large piece of fabric and put a box in the middle, then wrap the loose ends of the fabric over the bords of the box and glue them to the bottom with the help of a glue gun. If the box is too deep (like it was in my case), you should make several layers of wrapped up old newspapers to fill it. The rims of the box are decorated with dry leaves and the pineconean and fircones are glued down to the newspapers. Make sure you make a couple of layers to cover all the newspapers. 

Acorn animals

And finally, some silly beasts I made just for the fun of it using acorns and toothpicks. Use awl or a very thick needle to pierce the acorns and put the toothpicks in the holes.

There is a humorous saying in Russian that goes something like this: "He/she had a harsh childhood - wooden toys nailed down to the floor and stuff..." But the truth is, children love wooden toys like that. Just as I wrote this post, my daughter was excited to see the pictures and remembered how we made the animals with a smile :)

I guess, now it's all about making it to Christmas ;) Have lot's of ideas for this time of the year as well!