Hi there! Thanks for checking in, happy Friday, happy May Day, happy birthday for my amigas for whom that's the case. Quick and dirty, since this entire post has already been lost once this morning: here's the new mobile for the nursery. This all started with the little felted zebra, whom I picked up on clearance at Paper Source in the fall. I thought he was quirky and cute, and I kept thinking he'd be part of a great mobile. My initial thought was get him some animal friends and have them be part of some sort of flying mobile. In my search for similar creatures, I came across these adorable swinging critters on Etsy, and I was inspired.

So, I gathered my supplies:

This is all super simple. I picked up a branch, and had a shim I planned to use to make a swing. Inspired by the Etsy version, I decided to wrap my branch in yarn, and I had this heavy duty clear fishing wire on hand, to hang the whole thing. Not pictured: the handles of the swing itself, for which I initially used black and white ribbon, and eventually switched to black and white baker's twine. Making the whole things was pretty self-explanatory:

To break it down:

1. I attached my fishing wire, and then wrapped the branch with yarn, starting and ending with a dab of hot glue to keep things secure.

2. I cut, painted and drilled holes into my shim to create a swing.

3. This I attached to the branch with twine and hot glue.

4. Finally, I added my wee zebra, using hot glue to secure his bum to the seat and his hands to the swing handles.

But, of course, about midway through the project, I decided maybe Zeebs was too Dia de Los Muertos for my end vision? So Lou and I raided our stuffed animal stash (and maybe made one quick trip to the toy store across the street for additional zebra options) and checked out what other animals might look like on the swing. (Note, this was when the swing handles were still ribbon, not twine).

Well, those are all adorable. There's some swing sizing that could take place for the lion and second zebra, and I don't think these compare to the SweetBauerKnit inspiration (which I encourage you to support), but doesn't this inspire you to plop a stuffed animal on a swing and call it a day? In the end, obviously, I went back to my little felted Day of the Dead Zebra. He's cool, and the rest of the room is inspired and sourced so much by our trip to Colombia that adding in some additional Latin American flavor seems like a good way to go. What say you? In the meantime, I may keep looking for a slightly larger knit Zebra --- I'm smitten with the knit version and having a hard time keeping it out of my head. Here's hoping I find something more important to obsess over, pronto. Hear that bebe?

Thanks for reading and see ya Monday!