Kick-Start Creativity: Make Your Own Wind Chimes

by beyondBooksAttention: This post is over 3 years old and the information may be out of date.January 20, 2021

Craft by Sarah, staff member, Alderney Gate Public Library

We love sitting outside on our porch with a good book and a mug of tea, listening to the beautiful sounds of nature and our homemade wind chimes. If you're a fan of reusing materials found around your home and enjoy going for scavenger hunts, we're sure you'll love creating your own wind chimes out of found and repurposed materials. Kick-start your creativity by making a wind chime or wall hanging using materials found around your house.

Step 1: Gather supplies

We like to think of this step as being like a scavenger hunt. You get to run around your house or yard and find all of those things that are tucked into drawers and hidden in corners. Those things that you forgot you had and never use. We are looking for three types of things: a base, odds and ends to use as the “chimes”, and string or wire. One thing to keep in mind while looking for things is that if you want to hang your wind chime up outside the materials you choose will make a big difference in how long it lasts.

The base

For the base of the wind chime there are so many fun choices! What about a stick, pencil, or a knitting needle? You can use anything you can attach string or wire to. Here are some things we found when we were looking for a base:

What can you find?

The chimes

Now we are looking for things to hang from your base. Look for things like pop tabs, costume jewellery, beads, buttons, and old keys. Here's what we found.

The string

Anything that will attach your chimes to the base will work. Look for things like yarn, thread, wire, or ribbon.

Step 2: Put it all together

Now it’s time to get creative! Take all your pieces and put them together any way you like. Don’t forget to include a way to hang the wind chime up; perhaps a string on top of your base, or a wire hooked around it. Take a look at the examples below if you want some ideas.

We would love to see what you made! You can share your creations by using the hashtag #KickStartCreativityHfx