Wednesday Craft Group ~ Silk Angel Mobiles ~ a tutorial

The tables were packed this morning at craft group.

Every now and then more people turn up than we have kits for, today was one of those days.

To make one of these softly floating little angel mobiles you will need:

12 silk squares measuring roughly 12x12cm (what's that? about 5 and a bit inches), some gold thread or any other thread you fancy, a ring to hang them from - we used rattan...tho I was thinking that a long old tree branch would look nice too - with them all in a row. Some white fleece (stuffing wool), some strong thread to hang them ring with - we used linen thread. Oh! and a fine needle, scissors and some craft glue.

First up cut 12 lengths of the gold thread - about 50cm each and have them in handy reach.

Take a little bit of stuffing wool and form it into a tight ball in your hand; about the size of a small marble

Then put the ball of fleece into the centre of your first silk square; bring the silk up around your 'head' and hold tight at the neck.

Wrap a piece of gold thread twice around the neck and knot it twice too ~ leave as long a tail as possible. Thread your needle with the two tails and go in at the neck coming out right in the middle at the top of the head. Cut off your short tail level with the top of the head - careful not to snip your silk.

Ok repeat for the other 11 bits of silk!

Now cut three 50cm lengths of your linen thread and put to the side for a minute while you divide your ring into three...Not literally! Measure the outside of the ring and divide by three, make a small mark at each third. Fold your white thread in half - hold the loop end next to your mark on the ring and bring the two loose ends around the ring and through the loop, pull tight.

When you have done all three, hold up your ring to check for balance. With all strings together, tie a knot at the top, and then a second one a couple of cm away from the first - this will act as a loop for hanging.

Now for the fun bit. Find a place you can hang your ring from because it is so much easier to attach the angels at eye level than on a table. The order you hang your angels is completely up to you, I sang the little rainbow song on my head ~

Paint some red up in the sky,

some orange and some yellow way up high,

paint some green and blue,

some indigo too,

then paint some violet

and what do you get?

all the colours of the rainbow.

Attach each angel by its gold thread to the ring with a knot. Space them evenly and make each angel's gold thread shorter than the last. Shuffle them a little if you need to until it is balanced, then cut the spare bit of gold thread from each one and dab a spot of glue on the threads where they attach to the ring. All done.