Friday 14 February 2020

Weekend Mini-Make: DIY Rainbow Wall Hanging

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners

I'm back with my first Weekend Mini-Make of 2020: a quick craft you can complete over the weekend for less than a tenner. And even better than that, all my mini-makes are designed to be something beginners can try their hand at, whilst also being a relaxing, well-being boost. As I've mentioned before, I regularly turn to DIY and crafting when times get hard, so for me, having a creative outlet has become a vital part of my everyday life. I hope that these simple, cheap crafting ideas will inspire others to have a go, and see if it can make big changes in their life too.

This week I'm turning to wool and rope again, transforming it into a pretty accessory for little ladies nursery. I've been seeing these rainbow wall hangings all over the place lately, so just had to have a go at one myself! This is a lot easier than you think it might be, it only took me a couple of hours to make, and is the perfect item to fill an empty shelf or blank wall space.

Please note: This is not a toy, so keep out of reach of little hands

I've also put together a video tutorial for this, which you can watch here, or keep scrolling for the step-by-step instructions...



You will need 
3m of rope - I bought mine from eBay for £3.57, and its 8mm wide
Wool in different colours - I used five: pink, yellow, mustard, olive green, and burnt orange. I already had this wool from previous makes, however originally they were from eBay for £2.65 a ball. You don't use up much wool at all for this though, so I've still got loads left for future crafts.
Florists wire - You'll need some thin wire to help give the arches their shape. Again, I turned to trusty old eBay, and found some for 0.6mm florist wire for £1.64
Glue gun
Masking tape

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners

Total spend: £5.21

So first up, I laid the rope out in the rainbow shape to work out exactly how big I wanted it to be. I went with five 'arches', and my rainbow is 30cm tall. Once you're happy with how yours will look, snip the rope so you're left with five lengths, which will form your coloured arches. Don't forget that each length of rope will be slightly longer than the one next to it, so don't simply cut them all to the same size (a mistake I very nearly made!)

You'll now need to cut five strips of your florist wire to the exact same lengths, and these will be laid on top of the rope, underneath the wool to ensure the arches keep their shape.

Now tape off both ends of all your pieces of rope, making sure to tape the wire down in place at the same time. I actually also popped a piece of tape at the top point of the arch too, to keep the wire in place. The taped-off sections will become the 'clouds', so make sure to tape off enough if you want nice, long fringe. Then you're ready to start wrapping the wool!

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners

Spend some time deciding the order of your colours, and make sure you don't mix up your lengths. I actually started to wrap my darker coloured wool around one of the wrong lengths, meaning I had to take it off and start again. Once you're ready, simply wrap the wool around the rope all the way along the arch, going over the wire and rope together, and over the tape at the top centre point too.

This will take some time, but make sure you layer enough to hide the rope underneath. I didn't bother tying my wool in a knot at the end, just tucked it under another piece of wool. When you attach the arches together, the wool will be firmly fixed in place anyway.

Once you've wrapped all five lengths of rope, its time to stick them together. I would recommend using a hot glue gun for this, as I don't think the arches will hold in place well enough with anything else. Apply a strip of glue to the edge of each arch, working from above the tape off area around. It's really important that you don't get any glue on the tape, as you'll struggle to remove it. Stick the arches together in your rainbow shape.

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners

Now, its time to unravel the fringing to create the clouds! Carefully remove the tape from the ends of each bit of rope, and untangle the threads until its really fluffy. This actually took the most time of all, as I decided I wanted to untangle every single thread in the rope for maximum fluffiness.

Finally, if you want to hang this up, you'll need to add a loop of wool. I poked this through the top arch and tied it into a knot. With hindsight, this would have been easier to do during the glue-gunning stage.

And that's it, you're all done! How easy was that? There's so many colour combinations you could go for here too, I'd like to have another go at some mini-ones too at some point.

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners

DIY crafting tutorial on how to make a rope yarn rainbow shaped wall hanging, perfect for a Childs nursery or playroom. Crafting project using wool, glue glue, rope, wire. Simple crafting project perfect for beginners


Hope you enjoyed this quick and simple DIY - let me know if you make one, I'd love to see! And I'll be back next Friday with another quick craft perfect for completing over the weekend.

Thanks for reading,
Sam Xx
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