Make It: Backyard Bat Mobile
Create this striking Halloween craft starting with a branch from your backyard.
Photo: Odeelo Dayondon
Looking for a different kind of Halloween decoration? We spied this idea on marthastewart.com and found it was very easy and had many steps the kids could do themselves.
Materials
- Long branch
- Black spray paint (optional)
- Needle and thread
- Heavy black paper or card stock
- Bat template (optional)
- Cobwebs
Directions
- Paint your branch black.
- Download a bat template from marthastewart.com, print, and cut it out.
- Fold a piece of black paper, place the template along the fold and have the kids trace as may bats as the want. We used nine bats on our four-foot branch.
- Cut the bats out.
- Thread a needle, knot one end of the thread, and poke it through the bat. Tie the bat onto a branch. Repeat for each bat.
- Add some fake cobwebs to the branch.
- Use thread to hang the branch from a windowsill or suspend it from the ceiling.
Michele’s Tips
- We sprayed the branch black but it would still work if left natural.
- Vary the bats. We hung some with wings up and some with wings down. Some were strung from the center and others had strings tied to both wings.
Want more craft and treat ideas? See our Halloween Corner for those and our full roundup of spooky events on O‘ahu.
