IMPORTANT:
This toy has easily detachable, small parts. It must always be securely
attached at a height that is safely out of your child's reach.
I had a lovely time making this mobile when I was expecting Felix.
"Under the Sea" is a great theme for kids because there are so many forms and colours to choose from.
Felix has liked his mobile from the start. It's been a permanent fixture both above both his moses basket and his crib and now the familiar sight of it makes him laugh when he wakes up.
I didn't have a sewing machine last year so I made each piece by hand. But even though I have a machine now, I'd probably still sew these animals with needle and thread - the small shapes are very finicky to get into shape and need some tugging and molding as you go along.
The mobile frame is made from two chopsticks covered in yarn. For the sea creatures I used old t-shirts I found at home.
For hanging the mobile, you can use a sturdy hook in the ceiling above the crib or a mobile arm attachement that clips onto the crib.
This mobile has small, easily detachable pieces and long strings, so you must make sure it is safely attached and that there is no danger whatsoever of the mobile falling onto your baby, or your baby reaching and grabbing bit.
I personally preferred to order a crib mobile attachment arm. JL Childress make a fabulous one, I ordered mine through Amazon (click here to see the JL Childress web site).
Anyway, below are full instructions for making this Under the Sea mobile.
Have fun!
Materials
Instructions
1. Start by making the sea animals. Cut out the animal patterns (or if you prefer, use your own design).
2. Folded each piece of 24x12cm material in two, making sure the wrong side is facing out, then pin the patterns onto the material. I used: seahorse - turquoise, starfish - red, whale - blue, fish - yellow.
3. Cut out the material carefully along the edges of the patterns.
4. When you have the double piece of material cut our for each animal, unpin the pattern paper. Then repin the the two pieces of material together, still making sure the wrong sides are facing out.
5. Now sew each animal together. The animals need to be turned inside out and stuffed with cotton wool, so don't stitch all the way around, but leave a two finger wide gap in each.
6. Once each animal has been partially sewn, turn them inside out and fill with cotton wool. Put in a little bit of cotton at a time, rather than big lumps - the animals will be filled out more evenly this way. You will also be able to straighten and mold them as you go along. Use one of the chopsticks to push the cotton wool in right to the very tips of each animal's tail and nose.
7. Once they are stuffed, turn in the remaining border and sew the animals shut.
8. Now it is time to put some decoration on the animals.
First, work on the whale. The idea is to create a "spurt of water" coming out of the whales back.
Take your 150 cm of blue wool yarn, and the wool sewing needle and thread it with the wool - but don't knot the end. Find a place on top of the whale where the water would spurt out.
Sink your needle in and then aim it to come back out as close as possible to the entry hole. Now pull on the thread until there is 4cm left of the tail. Tie the string into a firm double knot right where the "water spurt" begins - this is to fix the yarn into place.
9. Place your cardboard piece on the whale (see on the left). Wind the yarn around it. Each time you go around, push the needle through the whale's back as close to the first needle entry hole as possible. Do this about eight to ten times.
10. Once done, ease the cardboard out carefully. You will now have several loops of wool on the top of the whale.
Take your scissors and cut the loops right at the top. You will now have a tuft of blue wool yarn that looks like water coming out of the whale's back.
If you want you can wet your fingers with water or a bit of hair spray and shape it.
NB: Notice how these strands of wool are not held to the whale by knots - this is one of the reasons for the safety warning: you should never leave this mobile within the baby's reach or attach it unsafely so it falls on him.
11. Move onto the other animals. Using the smaller cardboard piece, repeat this process with the fish and the sea horse to give each a tuft of "hair".
I used white for the fish and blue for the sea horse, but you can design each one exactly as you'd like it. The starfish has no "hair".
12. Finally, give the sea creatures some eyes.
First, using a marker pen, dot the places for the animals' eyes. Then take the blue thread and standard needle. Knot the end of the thread.
Push the needle in as close to the marker pen dot as possible and then push it out close.
Now, criss-cross a few stitches over each other in a small round area until an eye is formed. Hide the knot as you stitch. Once done, push needle through the star fish right through to other side. Stretch the thread whilst squashing the star fish flat and cut the thread very close to the abric, where it's coming out. Once cut, the end will be pulled into the star fish, thus dissappearing and not leaving an unattractive thread end.
13. Once the animals are done, put them to one side and work on the mobile frame. Take your white ball of yarn.
Important: First cut off one 60 cm piece, and four 50cm pieces and put these to one side until later.
14. Now place the chopsticks across eachother. Take your ball of yarn.
See the top diagram on the left: Leaving the tail end of the yarn dangling and feeding yarn from the ball, hold the cross firmly in place and loop yarn over the cross from A to B, and then going underneath the cross, back to A. Then twist the yarn around to D and over the cross to C - then back underneath to D. Tighten the yarn and make sure the yarn tail end is left trapped underneath the loops.
15. Repeat this a few times until the cross is firmly held. Make sure you are pulling the yarn as tight as possible.
16. Then twist the yarn from A to B to A severla times, about 15 loops should do. Now repeat from D to C to D the same amount of times. The idea is to make the cross stay firm, at right angles. Do as many layers of this as is needed to give a firm cross shape to the mobile frame.
17. Once you have done a layer of about ten twists each way in the centre of the cross, you can begin to work your way down the mobile's "branches". Go down one of the branches by winding the yarn around it, pulling it taught and tucking each loop tightly next to the previous one, all the way to the end of the stick. Make sure you cover the stick completely so no wood is visible. Once you reach the end, start winding back. When you get back to the cross in the middle, do a couple of loops each way and move onto the next branch, as before. Do this until all four are covered.
(If you are using plain wooden chop sticks and wool yarn, the textures have a lot of friction and the yarn holds in place. If your chop sticks are varnished, you might want to put a drop of glue at the end of the stick to stop the last loop from slipping off.)
18. Once all four branches of the mobile are covered twice, you'll be back at the centre.
Now is the time to pick your 60cm piece you cut off earlier. This is the string the whole mobile will hang from.
19. Tie it tightly around the middle of the cross, double knotting it on top of the cross.
20. Take your yarn (from the ball) and continue twisting it from A to B, and D to C, making sure the 60cm string you have tied in the middle of the cross comes out of the top.
Wind the ball yarn around so that there are the same number of loops on either side of it.
The string should come out right at the middle of the cross, held on either side by loops of tight yarn - see picture on the left.
21. All that remains is hanging and balancing the sea creatures from the mobile, yey!
Take one of the 50cm yarns. Thread the large yarn needle - don't tie a knot on the end.
Start with the whale. Insert the needle in the centre top of the whale, in the midst of the "water spurt" and push through. Pull the yarn through until you have a short tail end left, about the length of the water spurt yarns. Now tie the tail end with the longer end in a firm double knot. Cut the tail end so it's disguised in the water spurt.
Repeat with the fish and the sea horse.
22. Lastly, do the star fish. It has no hair so to have a neat finish you won't be able to hide the knot, just make sure your knots are neat and close together. Just push the needle through the highest point on the top tip of the star and, as previously, leave a short tail end. Tie the tail with the longer piece four times, very tightly. Cut any protruding tail end of yarn right down to the final knot.
23. Your animals are now ready to be tied to the mobile. First hang your mobile frame up, so it's comfortable for you to work with. The take the sea creatures and begin to experiment with weight and length of yarn, tyeing them loosely at first, right at the tips of the mobile's branches.
Because the chop sticks are thicker at one end and the animals are of differing weights, you'll find that each mobile element hang at a different height. This gives the mobile an lovely uneven yet balanced feel and look as it spins around slowly.
Once you've found a right height to hang each animal, secure the knots really firmly. The mobile pieces must NOT fall off onto the baby - use glue if in doubt.
I had a lovely time making this mobile when I was expecting Felix. "Under the Sea" is a great theme for kids because there are so many forms and colours to choose from.
Felix has liked his mobile from the start. It's been a permanent fixture both above both his moses basket and his crib and now the familiar sight of it makes him laugh when he wakes up.
I didn't have a sewing machine last year so I made each piece by hand. But even though I have a machine now, I'd probably still sew these animals with needle and thread - the small shapes are very finicky to get into shape and need some tugging and molding as you go along.
The mobile frame is made from two chopsticks covered in yarn. For the sea creatures I used old t-shirts I found at home.For hanging the mobile, you can use a sturdy hook in the ceiling above the crib or a mobile arm attachement that clips onto the crib.
This mobile has small, easily detachable pieces and long strings, so you must make sure it is safely attached and that there is no danger whatsoever of the mobile falling onto your baby, or your baby reaching and grabbing bit.
I personally preferred to order a crib mobile attachment arm. JL Childress make a fabulous one, I ordered mine through Amazon (click here to see the JL Childress web site).
Anyway, below are full instructions for making this Under the Sea mobile.
Have fun!
Materials
- Four 12 x 24cm pieces of stretch material in blue, turqoise, yellow and red
- A ball of white wool yarn
- About 150cm of baby blue wool yarn
- Sewing threads to match the materials, plus blue thread for the animals' eyes
- Cotton wool
- Standard needle for sewing thread
- Large-eyed needle for sewing with wool
- Two plain unvarnished wooden chop sticks*
- 2 x 6cm piece of thick cardboard
- 4 x 8cm piece of thick cardboard
- Marker pen
- Printed pattern sheet**
Instructions
1. Start by making the sea animals. Cut out the animal patterns (or if you prefer, use your own design).
2. Folded each piece of 24x12cm material in two, making sure the wrong side is facing out, then pin the patterns onto the material. I used: seahorse - turquoise, starfish - red, whale - blue, fish - yellow.
3. Cut out the material carefully along the edges of the patterns.
4. When you have the double piece of material cut our for each animal, unpin the pattern paper. Then repin the the two pieces of material together, still making sure the wrong sides are facing out.
5. Now sew each animal together. The animals need to be turned inside out and stuffed with cotton wool, so don't stitch all the way around, but leave a two finger wide gap in each.
6. Once each animal has been partially sewn, turn them inside out and fill with cotton wool. Put in a little bit of cotton at a time, rather than big lumps - the animals will be filled out more evenly this way. You will also be able to straighten and mold them as you go along. Use one of the chopsticks to push the cotton wool in right to the very tips of each animal's tail and nose.
7. Once they are stuffed, turn in the remaining border and sew the animals shut.
8. Now it is time to put some decoration on the animals.
Take your 150 cm of blue wool yarn, and the wool sewing needle and thread it with the wool - but don't knot the end. Find a place on top of the whale where the water would spurt out.
Sink your needle in and then aim it to come back out as close as possible to the entry hole. Now pull on the thread until there is 4cm left of the tail. Tie the string into a firm double knot right where the "water spurt" begins - this is to fix the yarn into place. 
9. Place your cardboard piece on the whale (see on the left). Wind the yarn around it. Each time you go around, push the needle through the whale's back as close to the first needle entry hole as possible. Do this about eight to ten times.
10. Once done, ease the cardboard out carefully. You will now have several loops of wool on the top of the whale.
Take your scissors and cut the loops right at the top. You will now have a tuft of blue wool yarn that looks like water coming out of the whale's back. If you want you can wet your fingers with water or a bit of hair spray and shape it.
NB: Notice how these strands of wool are not held to the whale by knots - this is one of the reasons for the safety warning: you should never leave this mobile within the baby's reach or attach it unsafely so it falls on him.
11. Move onto the other animals. Using the smaller cardboard piece, repeat this process with the fish and the sea horse to give each a tuft of "hair". I used white for the fish and blue for the sea horse, but you can design each one exactly as you'd like it. The starfish has no "hair".
12. Finally, give the sea creatures some eyes.
First, using a marker pen, dot the places for the animals' eyes. Then take the blue thread and standard needle. Knot the end of the thread. Push the needle in as close to the marker pen dot as possible and then push it out close.
Now, criss-cross a few stitches over each other in a small round area until an eye is formed. Hide the knot as you stitch. Once done, push needle through the star fish right through to other side. Stretch the thread whilst squashing the star fish flat and cut the thread very close to the abric, where it's coming out. Once cut, the end will be pulled into the star fish, thus dissappearing and not leaving an unattractive thread end.
Important: First cut off one 60 cm piece, and four 50cm pieces and put these to one side until later.
14. Now place the chopsticks across eachother. Take your ball of yarn.
See the top diagram on the left: Leaving the tail end of the yarn dangling and feeding yarn from the ball, hold the cross firmly in place and loop yarn over the cross from A to B, and then going underneath the cross, back to A. Then twist the yarn around to D and over the cross to C - then back underneath to D. Tighten the yarn and make sure the yarn tail end is left trapped underneath the loops.
15. Repeat this a few times until the cross is firmly held. Make sure you are pulling the yarn as tight as possible.
16. Then twist the yarn from A to B to A severla times, about 15 loops should do. Now repeat from D to C to D the same amount of times. The idea is to make the cross stay firm, at right angles. Do as many layers of this as is needed to give a firm cross shape to the mobile frame.
17. Once you have done a layer of about ten twists each way in the centre of the cross, you can begin to work your way down the mobile's "branches". Go down one of the branches by winding the yarn around it, pulling it taught and tucking each loop tightly next to the previous one, all the way to the end of the stick. Make sure you cover the stick completely so no wood is visible. Once you reach the end, start winding back. When you get back to the cross in the middle, do a couple of loops each way and move onto the next branch, as before. Do this until all four are covered. (If you are using plain wooden chop sticks and wool yarn, the textures have a lot of friction and the yarn holds in place. If your chop sticks are varnished, you might want to put a drop of glue at the end of the stick to stop the last loop from slipping off.)
18. Once all four branches of the mobile are covered twice, you'll be back at the centre. Now is the time to pick your 60cm piece you cut off earlier. This is the string the whole mobile will hang from.
19. Tie it tightly around the middle of the cross, double knotting it on top of the cross.
20. Take your yarn (from the ball) and continue twisting it from A to B, and D to C, making sure the 60cm string you have tied in the middle of the cross comes out of the top.Wind the ball yarn around so that there are the same number of loops on either side of it.
The string should come out right at the middle of the cross, held on either side by loops of tight yarn - see picture on the left.
21. All that remains is hanging and balancing the sea creatures from the mobile, yey!
Take one of the 50cm yarns. Thread the large yarn needle - don't tie a knot on the end.
Start with the whale. Insert the needle in the centre top of the whale, in the midst of the "water spurt" and push through. Pull the yarn through until you have a short tail end left, about the length of the water spurt yarns. Now tie the tail end with the longer end in a firm double knot. Cut the tail end so it's disguised in the water spurt.
Repeat with the fish and the sea horse.
22. Lastly, do the star fish. It has no hair so to have a neat finish you won't be able to hide the knot, just make sure your knots are neat and close together. Just push the needle through the highest point on the top tip of the star and, as previously, leave a short tail end. Tie the tail with the longer piece four times, very tightly. Cut any protruding tail end of yarn right down to the final knot.
23. Your animals are now ready to be tied to the mobile. First hang your mobile frame up, so it's comfortable for you to work with. The take the sea creatures and begin to experiment with weight and length of yarn, tyeing them loosely at first, right at the tips of the mobile's branches. Because the chop sticks are thicker at one end and the animals are of differing weights, you'll find that each mobile element hang at a different height. This gives the mobile an lovely uneven yet balanced feel and look as it spins around slowly.
Once you've found a right height to hang each animal, secure the knots really firmly. The mobile pieces must NOT fall off onto the baby - use glue if in doubt.
And you're done.
Happy crafting! I hope your baby enjoys this mobile made with love.
