Homemade African Ankle Bells

I have actually decided to try and teach some music this year at our school. We are concentrating on folk music from around the world. I received help from that ladies at the 4Real Forum. They directed me to this amazing site: Putumayo World Music. This site, and our well stocked local library is all I will need for the entire school year.

Our first stop on the globe is Africa. We have been having a wonderful time learning about music from all over this large continent.

I also wanted to add musical instruments to our studies, but everything out there is soooo expensive, so I decided to make some ankle bells for the kids to enjoy from our trip to Africa.

I found a single string of bells online for $20.00, but for $4.00 and one hour of time I made a strand of bells for each of the little learners.

Wal-mart had everything I needed. I bought Christmas jingle bells, fringed edging, and red rick-rack

I strung the bells onto the fringe, folded it over and pinned it.

Then it was quite easy to sew this into place. I moved my needle over to the left to make room for the bells as I sewed.

Lastly, I sewed on the rick-rack. This added color and provided the ties for the bells.

Here is the finished, blurry, product. Children DO NOT stand still while wearing these, as you can see in the video below.