Tutorial: hot air balloon mobile

My recent exploration of baby blogs showed that hot air balloon has made quite a few appearance in nurseries. I liked the looks, so I ventured to make my own. Here's the process and it is very simple.

1. Using a scrap piece of paper, fold in half and cut out a pattern of hot air balloon. I free-handed mine. Just remember to cut a little square at the bottom so that your balloon has a little basket. You can't go wrong with this process. Continue cutting until you get the desired shape and size. This will serve as a template to make your mobile.


2. Using scrapbooking paper, choose the desired color for your overall color scheme. Since I had a packet of 12x12 scrapbook paper in fairly heavy weight, I just went through the colors and choose 6 colors that are visibly different from one another. Again, you can't go wrong here. You can choose two colors and repeat the color pattern or choose 6 different colors or any combination thereof.


3. Use your template in #1, cut out 6 balloons in your desired color as chosen in #2. I find it easiest to fold the template and colored papers in half and cut. It yield the best symmetry that way.

4. Once you have 6 balloons, it's time to assemble them. My preferred adhesive is double-sided tape and my go to brand has always been Pioneer photo memory mounting taper that I get from Michael's at about $3 a roll. I have used these to assemble my wedding invitations a few years back and they hold so well. I have also tried other brands and I feel like they just don't hold well when it came to heavy cardstock, especially metallic ones. I'm sure any other adhesive will work though. I simply cut strips of tape and tape it at the spine of each balloon. This is why it comes in handy to fold your paper in half when you cut out the shape in #3. I assemble them using 3 balloons at a time to get a half 3D balloon.


5. Using a piece of twine, attach the ends to the adhesive before taping the 2 halves together. You don't have to do this process if you intend to use other ways to hanging the balloons, such as a mobile clip. Since I planned to just hang them haphazardly from the ceiling, twine is a great way alternative.

6. Assemble the two halves together once the twine is taped.

7. I knot the twine at the top of the balloon to give it a finished look and voila, you got yourself a 3D paper hot air balloon. Repeat this process to get the number of balloons for the desired look. I went with 10.



Watch your balloons take flight.