Interchangeable Montessori Mobiles

Maria Montessori did not develop guidelines in particular for infants, but she believed in the value of respecting and nurturing the life of the mind from birth, and based on her research, Montessorians have since developed recommendations for the Montessori infant space. 

One of the most important parts of this Montessori infant space is the presence of the mobile, which serves as the child's first work. The visual mobiles were all specifically designed to meet developmental needs, such as concentration, depth perception, and vision. They also provide beauty, focus, and order to the environment, all of which are important in any Montessori prepared environment. 

I love this post at How We Montessori  if you are interested in reading more about why Montessori believes in the importance of the mobile. 

I wanted the mobile elements to be interchangeable on one base, as this felt more minimalist to me, and I thought it would be easier to keep them for the next baby this way. I got the idea from the design of the universal soother clip, which attaches to any kind of soother with a loop like this.

Each element of each mobile has a loop tied into the string which I thread through the eye screw and then around the mobile piece as you can kind of see in the bottom picture. When pulled tight, it creates a knot which is easy to untie when I want to change the mobile out. 

First of all, this is the universal mobile frame. It is two pieces of dowel attached at a cross with a hook at the top. It is suspended over the infant area by a ribbon that hangs from the roof, onto which I sewed two rings. This is the ribbon I will use for the visual mobiles. I have another ribbon with a bit of elastic sewn on the bottom, which will be for the tactile mobiles.

Munari Mobile 

Here is my version of the first mobile offered in the Montessori mobile series, the Munari mobile. The original mobile is specifically hung on three different pieces of dowel all painted in contrast to each other, but I wanted to make just the one base for the visual mobiles, with the capability of changing out the mobile elements.

I printed off the images from the link I provided above and laminated them. They are hung with a loop of thread at different lengths, and I am quite happy with how it turned out.

Octahedron Mobile

The next mobile I will offer the baby is the Octahedron, which I created following the instructions at this link. 

Gobbi Mobile

Next up is the Gobbi mobile. 

Most diy instructions online require you sew the thread through a hole you poke in the middle, but I found it was too difficult to make it look uniform this way. I ended up dipping the thread in white glue and wrapping it around a styrofoam ball, starting at each end so that it made a neat spiral which met in the middle. 

Again, this is my version of the mobile, and it is not exactly true to the original mobile which staggers the balls in a straight line, with the darkest-coloured ball measuring the longest and the lightest measuring the shortest. 

Butterfly Mobile

This is not an official Montessori mobile, but many Montessori families make similar mobiles. I was not intending to, but I ended up finding these butterfly wall stickers, which I knew would work perfectly, and I am so happy with the dreamy end result.

It was a pretty simple process using the stickers, as I was able to just stick them on a piece of flexible cardboard and cut them out. I sewed a piece of thread through two places in each butterfly so they would hang in a balance and staggered them somewhat.

Thank you for reading! If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me. I would also love to hear any suggestions for posts you would like me to write about. And if you are interested in following along in our daily adventures, follow us on Instagram where I post daily.

God bless,
Olivia Fischer