DIY Tree Leaf Mobile DIY For Kids

 
Maintaining the same theme of my last few posts, this mobile project was inspired by the beautiful autumn. I wanted to experiment mixing different materials from nature, with paper and glitter to bring some spark and fun. Hope you enjoy making this project and bring something beautiful to your favourite room.

Materials:
* Small tree branch (around 20cm long)
* Black thick paper (I used 240g)
* Gold metallic paper
* Black bakers twine
* Gold and silver glitter
* Glue
* Scissors
* Invisible thread
* Pen
* Metallic pen (silver or gold)

Step by step

1 and 2) Draw and cut the leaf templates for the different shapes on white paper. Trace them in the black or gold paper and cut them around.

3) Tie some black bakers twine at both edges of the branch.

4 and 5) Using a metallic ink pen draw some details inside the black leaves.

6) Add some glue on the sides of each circle and put some glitter on it. Make sure you cover them all, this was actually my favourite part!

7) Once you have all your elements together align them flat in the order show in the image below, make sure they have about the same separation between them. Add some glue in one side of each shape (I  found that adding glue in both sides gets messy, specially working with little shapes and glitter) of each shape and cute around 3 x 50 cm of invisible thread (I like to have extra at the top and bottom in case of mistakes).

8) This step is a bit fiddly, an extra pair of hands would help. Place the invisible thread very carefully across the shapes from top to bottom (it might help to tape the thread in the table to add some tension) and bring the non glued shapes on top and press until they completely dry.

9) Once the shapes are completely dry, make little cuts around the gold shapes at the end to create the feather effect, making sure not to cut the invisible thread in the middle. (This picture isn’t clear enough sorry!)

10) Tie a long piece of black bakers twine at the centre to hang the mobile from the ceiling.

11) To complete the mobile, tie the three strings to the branch starting with the middle (leave this one longer than the other two) and then tie the remaining two to the edges. Cut the extra thread (if necessary add a dot of glue in the knots to secure them from falling)

12) Your mobile is complete. Now you can place your beautiful mobile in your favourite room, get cosy and enjoy it!

x
Jess