Monday, July 29, 2013

A Swarm of Butterflies

On one of my many excursions into the world of Pinterest I stumbled upon this pin, of a gorgeous butterfly mobile. When I looked for more such pins there appeared to be a small market on Etsy for such cute creations, though the price tags left a lot to be desired. So I decided I could and would DIY-it!

I found a paper cutter with a gorgeous butterfly design in Lincraft for $25. I also bought an embroidery hoop for $3 to form the base of the mobil. I decided I would use paint swatches so that I could create an ombre effect. I collected A LOT of paint swatches from various hardware stores around our area (& I mean A LOT)! And I began punching out the butterfly stencils. This was far harder than I had anticipated and left me with a really sore wrist. I also had not thought through the fact that the back of the paint swatch has printing all over it.

So I gathered even more paint swatches and cut out even more butterflies and decided I would stick two cut-outs together for each butterfly on the mobil. This also helped with gluing the butterflies to the fishing line as it formed a sandwich around the line.










Unfortunately my husband was working some extraordinarily long hours and so I had many hours to spend cutting and gluing butterflies to fishing line and hanging the strands to dry on the clothes hoist. I used ribbon from my ribbon-vase to hide the embroidery hoop and wire, tied some tule to the top and it was ready to hang in Kyah's room.

I really love the little hints of pink that are featuring in the beautiful orange nursery we created for her. I love this delicate  mobil that hangs between her cot and her changing table so she can enjoy it in both places. And I really loved making this little craft project for her.

Do you want one? I will make you one far cheaper than the $70-$100 I saw them advertised on Etsy for. For full DIY instructions see this pin.






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