DIY Woodland Mobile

It's done! This is the project I've been most excited about since I decided to do a woodland themed nursery. Despite that, it's the one project I've been most apt to put off. Truth be told, I probably would have put it off again if it weren't for the fact that I declared last week on the blog that I would share it this week. Thanks for the push, blog. 

Things have been a little overwhelming lately - between my 16 year old brother still in the hospital almost a month after a surgery that was only supposed to result in a 5-8 day stay, and a toddler that has suddenly decided she would rather choose death than separation from Mama, I haven't had the time or the motivation to work on extra projects. I'm just thankful in these pictures, you won't be able to see the rest of my house. Thankfully, things seem to be calming down, so hopefully soon, my house will be back to the moderate disarray it's normally in instead of the state of chaos it's in now.

To make Bubba's (as he's become affectionately known as) mobile, I found a couple of sticks that seemed to already be the right length and thickness and let them dry out in our garage. One of the sticks is 23" long and the other is 18" long. After laying my bottle brush ornaments out, I decided to line four of them up along the longer stick and the other two on the shorter one, with one placed in the middle of both. After deciding on my layout, I determined the way I wanted everything measured out and drilled holes.

While I wanted the sticks to look as natural as possible, I didn't want any part of them falling into the crib, so next I sanded them until they felt smooth enough, but still maintained a natural, rustic look. Thankfully, I've got a blanket set aside for dirty projects, so I took my sanding inside to avoid the cold that comes along with this view outside our back door.

I started assembling the mobile by threading a piece of twine through the center holes on the sticks and tying knots to secure them together. Then I threaded the strings on the ornaments  up through the remaining holes in the spots that I had decided on and tied them off until the knots were large enough not to slip back through.

With Lucy still soundly sleeping in the next room over, I sneaked into the nursery with a chair, some twine and scissors, threaded and tied off the twine on one end of each branch and draped it over an existing ceiling hook to the point that I was happy with the height. Then I finished things off by threading the twine through the other ends of the branches and tying things off. I won't be exactly sure where it will hang until there's a crib in the room and I've hung some other things, but I'm loving it enough just hanging where Lucy's old mobile hung, for the time being.

And the way it will look from Bubba's point of view:

I hope he'll like it as much as I do, and as much as Lucy loved her crane mobile. I can't believe how much I put this off, considering it took me less than a single nap time. Next up, curtains. I've already got one pieced together, so I'm well on my way.

What projects have you been putting off, big or small?

If you are interested in bottle brush ornaments for any project, I had a friend give me a heads up that West Elm is selling this cute little guy for less than $1.