Diy Baby Gym.

Baby French Fry is growing like a potato and I am eating up every second with this little lady.  As my maternity leave time winds down, I've had some fun creating a few projects for her, and a baby gym was one of those.

She was gifted a lovely activity mat similar to this which she cannot get enough of.  The problem I've started running into though, is that she's grown SO quickly (she's only 3 months but already the size of a 6-7 month old) that she's able to grab and easily get a hold of most of the dangling toys and I can't adjust the height of the gym.  This baby's got some long arms.

Let's hope we don't have a baby Stretch Armstrong on our hands.  Remember this guy?  Ours developed a weird old rubber eraser smell after a while, which is a smell I'm fond of in the Art Room these days...

One of my favorite bloggers at Reading My Tea Leaves, gave a beautifully descriptive tutorial on creating a homemade baby gym.  And I'm not kidding folks, everything she writes and photographs is beautiful and simply inspiring.  So, I decided to give the baby gym a shot.

All I needed were 3 dowel rods, some leather, a pack of cabone rings (find these in the knitting section at an artsy store), and a little Boy Scout knot tying. If I recall I think my dowels were 3/8" and pre-cut to 36 inches long.  You can find dowels like this at any hardware type of store or most craft stores too. I picked up the leather and cabones from my local Michaels (and couponed it up).

All I could think about when I was tying these knots was some of the fun rhymes from Boy Scouts.  I hated Girl Scouts and all its girliness (learning dance steps and cooking were sooooo not my thing) and I participated in it for less than a year, opting instead to join my brothers at their Boy Scout meetings.  Right over left, left over right, makes a knot both tidy and tight.

To make this little tipi, I just had to weave the leather over and under and then loop it back around and repeat a few times, always making sure the leather was nice and taut.

Once I finished the weaving, I just knotted the leather back on the same pole I had started at the beginning.  And voila! I had a little tipi frame that I can collapse and store in a snap.

Next up, I used the cabone rings and leftover ribbon from my hoarding drawer to create a few different baby gym accessories.  Baby French Fry has about as short of an attention span as I do, so having a few different rings to mix it up helps keep her entertained.

 

I love how storage-able this gym is.  Is that a word?  No?  Now it is.  We've got limited space in our home, so the more storage-able something is, the better.

Baby French Fry (and her loyal furry protector) loves her little tipi and it only cost about $8 to make, including the cost of the dowels, leather, and wood rings.

Love these ladies so much.