Ghost Mobile

Here's a quick piece of decoration I made with my daughter a few days ago. It's easy to make and requires stuff that I expect to be readily avaliable if you do not already have them at home. 

Here is what you need:

- paper balls, different sizes are optional
- tissue paper, white, thin and square
- string, I used beige/almost white, but you can achieve a better floating effect with nylon
- something to hang the ghosts from, I used a metal ring I had laying around, but you could also use skewers or something similar


Tools that will come in handy:

- scissors
- needle, thick and sturdy
- pen

Take a length of string and use the needle to pull it through a paper ball. I had to use a solid surface to push the ball down on the needle, and wriggle it to pull it through. Leave the string in the needle, you will need it for the next step.

Then, pull the string through till there is just enough remaining on one side to make two simple overhand knots. Use them to tie the string to the ball, as shown in the picture (the second one got a little blurred, but that's kids for you).

Take a tissue paper and find the center. You can do this either in the old school fashion, which is another way of saying you can guess, or you do it properly by gently folding the paper diagonally and mark the middle by running a finger over the fold around the center. Do this for both diagonals and you get two crossed folds, marking the center for you. I know, it might not be more acurate than good guesswork, but it looks more professional.

If you did not leave the string in the needle, put it back in, and punch if through the center of the tissue paper. Pull it through till the tissue rests on top of the ball.

Wrap the tissue paper gently around the ball - you will see the shape we are going for already. Take a short length of string and wrap it around the ghost's "neck", make an overhand knot and pull it tight just a little. Be careful not to tear the paper.

Use a felt tip marker or something similar do draw a face on the ghost. My daughter was especially fond of being the Ghostfacer - sorry, I could not resist that one. Cheap, I know.

Anyway, She produced some interesting faces with a rather big-tipped black marker, and the tissue paper sucking up a little more ink gives it a rather interesting texture.

Decide where you want your ghosts to hang. You can use them as decoration as they are, and disperse them all over your place, 

But you can also bring them together and have them dance a spooky roundelay. For the one we made, we put one of the big-headed ghosts on the string of the other. Then, I used two pieces of string and tied them to the metal ring, one end to each of four corners of an imaginary square. Then I used the string of the two larger ghosts to connect the two and make a small loop to hang the whole thing from.

The remaining small ones we connected to the ring, dispersing them evenly and varrying their height.

That's it! Put them somewhere where they can catch some draft, like above a radiator, and watch them perform their moves. They might also work well in combination with a lamp casting shadows, but keep them at a distance from any potentially hot object, just to be on the safe side.