Stuffed Whale Mobile

I made my son-to-be a whale mobile! I have seen mobiles on Etsy costing $95! Whaaaat? Below is a picture of the mobile that was on Etsy. Check it out if you want to spend that kind of money on something that cost me about $5 and a little free time.

 

Click here to visit the Whale Mobile on Etsy

Below are the pictures of my version of a while mobile and I love it!

I used yarn that you would used to crochet hot pads for the whales to hang from.

 Lily Sugar and Cream

 The yarn at the top of the mobile was quadrupled and twisted over itself to give it a more hardy, nautical "rope" look. 

You can't see it from any of the pictures but I used a key-chain ring to secure the three "ropes" together so it could be hung on a hook that was secured to the ceiling. 

I had some leftover wooden beads that worked perfect for this project so I just tied knots in the string to keep them in place. (You can see where one of the beads has fallen because my knot wasn't big enough)

I found a round wooden ring at the DI for .25 cents that worked perfect for the structure. I covered it with a fun fabric using craft glue.

I made my own pattern for the whale that you can use yourself if you would like. I cut two of each piece for one whale. It took some adjusting to make them the right size. The size that worked for me was a little bigger than a 1/3rd of a sheet of paper. 1/2 a sheet was just too big. Sizing it to 1/3rd of a sheet is probably the smallest I would go if you are going to be stuffing it because it is difficult to get the stuffing into the tail since the opening is small.

What you will need to make a stuffed whale:

• This pattern. Its easy just to copy and paste this into a word document and then adjust it to the size you want from Word. Print and then cut out each piece. 
• Contrasting craft felt. 25 Cents a piece at Hobby Lobby (I used blues and Grays for the body, White for the belly and blue, gray and orange for the fins) One what uses approximately 1/2 a sheet of felt. I bought 6 sheets of felt and I have tons left over.
• Thread. I used white because I don't mind the contrast
• Sewing machine. It is also possible to hand stitch the entire whale. But a little more time consuming. I did this one one of the test whales. I blanket stitched all the way around the whale. Gave it a lot of character but it sure was time consuming. 
• Sewing needle
• Polly-Fill

1) Sew the contrasting belly piece to the body piece. I liked the look of the stitching so just sewed the belly piece to to the underside of the body piece.

2) Hand sew the fins to the body. I used a contrasting color as you can see by my photos above. I just used one stitch that I went back over a couple of times to secure it.

3) Sew the two body pieces together leaving the belly un-sewn so that I could put all the stuffing.

4) Stuff that whale full of polly-fill. I liked them pretty full but you can do less as you desire.

5) Stitch the belly closed. I used a blanket stitch. I like the look of the stitching so I went with a stitch that you would be able to see. I also think because of the size and the amount of stuffing I used, that it would be harder to do an invisible stitch.

6) You have your little stuffed whale. Enjoy!