Sunday, August 17, 2008

Bird Mobile

I have been admiring Spool's Bird Mobile for some time, and have had it on my list of things to make for the baby. Ohdeedoh posted about a black, red & white version which is genius as these are the colours are high contrast and offer the most development before 6 months.

This was all the inspiration I needed to get started and here it is:


The birds are very easy to sew, I cut and sewed them in an afternoon. The original describes hand sewing which I think it unnecessary and to be honest I doubt the birds would look as good. You only need about 15 cm of each fabric.
I gathered the sticks from a Jacaranda tree in the backyard and I spray painted them black. At first I tried jewellery wire but it was too stiff so changed to fishing wire at my hubbies suggestion which sits much much better.
I needed his help balancing it too, a few blogs describe it as difficult and it is. I managed by working upwards, first sewing the bottom bird on and attaching him through his head. Then I looped a fair cotton through the tail of the next levels birds and arranged them to balance. The other method I tried was a little easier, but I don't think the results were as good was to just assemble to twig as I wanted then found it's balance point.
The whole project took a few nights and and afternoon.