Tools and Materials
- white and bright pastel A4 card
- paper scissors for cutting the cardboard shapes
- a pen or pencil for tracing the design
- pretty thread for stitching the mobile together
- a topstitch needle for stitching through the cardboard layers
- an awesome sewing machine
Cutting out the card shapes
I chose A4 card in the same kind of saturated pastel colours from the book for the balloons and white for the clouds. At first, I looked around for a air balloon template but then I decided to make my own, really, how hard could it be?! I just aimed for a shape that was similar to the balloon on the front cover. I folded the card in half lengthwise and played with the shape until I was happy. Then I cut it out and used it as a template to draw the balloon shapes on more card.
Then I did the same thing with the cloud shapes. Dr Seuss illustrations are playful and wonky. So I just had fun and tried not to worry too much about being perfect. I varied the cloud shapes to make it more interesting.
Stitching it all together
Before starting, I put a 90/14 Titanium coated Topstitch needle in the Juki DX7 machine. The titanium coating keeps the needled sharp for longer and it stitched through the 3 layers of card easily. I also adjusted the stitch length to 4.2 on the right hand dial. The larger stitch length looked pretty and kept the needle holes from perforating the card.
My plan was to begin with a cloud then stitch through a balloon and then another cloud. But I needed a nice long thread tail to hang up the mobile. So before I started stitching, I raised the pressure foot, and gently pulled a long tail of thread. Then I stitched through the cloud, raised the needle and pulled a bit of thread through before starting on the balloon. The balloons were created by layering 3 balloon shapes, one on top of the other, then stitching down the centre fold.
When I got to the end of the balloon, I raised the needle and pulled a bit more thread through so that there would be some space between the cloud and the balloon. Then I carried on stitching through the card shapes and leaving a bit of extra thread in between to space out the shapes so they would hang nicely.
To get the 3D effect, I simply finger pressed the layers so they would open up. Then I made a bunch more. When we got to Emily’s house for the shower, I tied the thread tails to the curtain rod. It looked great.
Bringing it all together
Another fun decoration was the table cloth we made. Robert Kaufman came out with Dr Seuss fabric that went with the book! We used a rolled hem stitch on the Juki MO2000 overlocker to make the perfect tablecloth for the party. Fun food, family and friends rounded off a lovely day. Emily’s baby shower was super fun. Now all we need is the baby!
[…] so near Easter but you could make a template from any simple shape. In an earlier post, I made a cloud and air balloon mobile for a baby shower that used the same technique. But simple shapes are best when working with small […]