a mobile for motor

i finally finished the mobile for motor's room. i started it over a month ago and had most of it done, but i got sidetracked by a vacation, and some new hobbies (more on that later!) and so it kinda just sat in my bag waiting to be worked on. after have two people in the same week inquired about either 1) how i did it or 2) could i replicate it if they paid me (yes please!) i decided it was time to get with the program and get 'er done.

to recap, i was looking for diy mobiles on the web, and found this particular one on made by rae's site:
she took finger puppets from ikea and clipped them to a hanging photo mobile for a quick and easy mobile for her son's room. the puppets were cute, but i really liked the idea of using the photo mobile to clip something to - that is WAY easier than some of the diy stuff i saw.

then i found the following mobile on etsy...soooooo cute! except i really only wanted to do starfish and maybe surfboards in the baby's room. and it cost $115. um, no. i can do so much more with a hundred bucks than pay for a decoration to hang from the ceiling. plus it looked easy enough to recreate myself, so i did :).

i'll start off by saying my little starfishies are a lot less fancy-pants than the ones pictured above. but i don't care, and i actually really like the way they turned out! here are the "constructions", as my cousin ethan used to call instructions:

what you need:

needle

felt in desired colors

paper/thin cardboard or cardstock

embroidery thread in desired colors

batting

scissors

sewing pins

fabric pen/sharpie

photo mobile

1. create your stencil

start by taking your paper and sketching out whatever shape you hope to create. for my starfish i drew a sample piece on paper first, then cut it out. then, because it wasn't very symmetrical i retraced an "arm" from that first attempt that i liked to create 2 1/2 arms, folded the paper in half and then cut it out. now it was symmetrical! (if that doesn't make sense please leave a comment and i will attempt to explain further)

2. trace stencil on felt

once i had my stencil created i took my two pieces of felt, pinned them together, and traced my stencil on the felt with a thin sharpie.

3. cut your felt

once traced, keep your felt pinned together and add another pin to the center of your traced shape. cut out your shape, being careful not to let the bottom piece of felt slip or your two pieces won't be the same size!

4. sew the two pieces together

thread your needle with the embroidery thread color of your choice. because the top piece of felt will have some pen marks on it, i flipped both pieces over and pinned them together again to hide the marks. put a knot at the very end of your thread and start on the INSIDE of your felt and sew around the edges. i wrapped my stitches around because i wanted to be able to see the color (the embroidery thread is also thick which is why i chose that instead of thin thread). you can get as creative as you want with the thickness and style of your stitches.

the very first starfish i did i left blank in the middle and just sewed the edges together. to make them look a little more starfish-like and a little less star-like i decided to add the decorative stitches in the middle. to do this i just started in the very middle of the inside before moving on to sewing the edges together.

5. stuff your shape

before sewing all of the edges together, take small amounts of batting and stuff your shape to give it some character. however pay attention to the object you're stuffing and how thick it should be...i made two surfboards when i was originally planning on using them, and the first one i overstuffed and it wound up looking like a black banana and not at all like a surfboard :). i used a pen to push the batting into the thin arms of my starfish, and i recommend not pushing too much in at a time! a little bit can go a long way :).

you may decide that your object would look better not stuffed - in that case, skip this step! if this is the case, you may decide as well to use the stiff felt instead of the flexible felt, which should create much cleaner lines if so desired (good for shapes with hard edges/straight lines).

6. finish it off

finish sewing the last few edges together, adding any additional batting you may need to. i typically left one "arm" of my starfish open, stuffed the other four, then sewed almost all the way around the last arm before adding the final batting and sewing it closed. cut off the rest of the thread!

7. repeat as needed with other colors/shapes etc until you have 10 total shapes

8. assemble your mobile

clip your shapes to the photo mobile. i purchased my mobile from a local store that carried them, but you can also order them online. amazon was much cheaper than the store i bought from; just search for "photo mobile" and look for the one from kikkerland. decide where to hang your mobile from and then sit back and admire your handiwork :)