Door Swags

In order to prep for our "Door Swags" we had to get into contact with Dennis, a member of the West Allis Community Garden Club and also the UW-Extension program. For the past four years, Dennis has helped us out by cutting down branches from four different types of evergreen trees and shrubs in his yard. These are the four different types of branches he brought us this year:

• White Pine
• Balsam Fir
• Juniper
• American Yew (Taxus Canadensis)

After we prepped for the base, or main part, of the "Door Swags" we had to think about sprucing them up a bit with some holiday decorations. Ms. Hendrickson went and collected pine cones from a park near her house and Ms. Verbanac went to Michaels and bought holiday ribbon. Mrs. Pfaller, a retired EA at our school, took this ribbon and made bows with it. We also had to make sure we had garden wire to secure the pieces of evergreen together.

Before the meeting, we had to prep by cutting longer pieces of wire for the students to wrap around the different types of evergreens to keep them together as well ask wrapping smaller pieces of wire onto the pine cones and bows so these could be secured to the "Door Swag". Because some of the evergreens, especially the Juniper, seemed to be pretty "spikey" we also made sure to have garden gloves on hand for the meeting. We laid out all the evergreens on tables in our classroom, each table having a different type of evergreen. We also had two other tables for the pine cones and bows.

At the start of our meeting, as a whole group, we described/taught about each of the evergreens and then modeled for the students how the process of making their "Door Swag" would go. When describing/teaching about the different types of evergreens, we talked about things like "How can we tell it's a White Pine? Because the leaves, or needles, come off in groups of 5, White has 5 letters, so that's how we can remember it's a White Pine." We looked up all the evergreens and described the features of the needles, if it has berries, etc.

We then modeled and walked them through how to make their "Door Swag". First, students picked a White Pine branch and wrapped their long wire, about three times, around the main branch at the top. The White Pine is the base of the "Door Swag". Then, the students grabbed a Yew branch and laid it on top of the White Pine as the next layer. They took their long wire and wrapped it around the Yew branch so it is now together with the White Pine. Students then did the same with a Balsam Fir branch, and finally, a Juniper branch. After students layered all four branches together and wrapped their long wire around, leaving about 4 inches left, students went to Ms. Verbanac or Kork Verbanac for her/him to help them with the loop to be able to hang their "Door Swag".

Students then went to the decorating stations where they were able to pick out one or two pine cones--they took the small wire and attached it on the front of their "Door Swag". Finally, students were able to pick out a bow and wire it around at the top of their "Door Swag" as well.

Supplies: evergreen branches, pine cones, ribbon, wire, wire cutter, garden gloves, plastic garbage bags (used as table cloths on the tables that we put the evergreen branches on)

We would like to thank all of our volunteers who helped out with this project: Kork Verbanac for coming in and helping at each meeting, and Linda Pfaller for making all the bows and helping at each meeting. A special thanks to Mary Koller and Kitty Dufek-Maier, two members of the WA Community Garden Club who came to help us out with this project! All of your help was very much appreciated, thank you! Another thank you to Dennis, for all of your time and help in getting us all the evergreen supplies!