How to make a Solar System

We have been studying the planets for the last little while at our house.  And we decided to make a {little} solar system of our own. Here's the "before" photo of our planets:

 

And the "after" version.

 

I decided to keep things simple and just pulled out the yarn bag for {this little project}.  I don't knit or crochet, but somehow I have a yarn bag.  There's a lot of fun to be had with yarn, as you can see :)

 We gave special treatment to the four "gas giants" and they got their sparkly rings via some chenille stems.

Jay knows his planets well and was very specific in how it all turned out.

So we made the variety of the sizes and colors are as close as we could come to "real life."

If you want to make {this little project} I recommend picking up this set of 8 foam balls at the Dollar Tree store.  It along with a few others gave us a nice variety of sizes to work with.  I used a straight pin poked through the end of the yarn to finish off the wrapping of each "planet".

 

The sun needed to be quite a bit bigger, so we followed the directions from {this little project} and used a balloon to make it.

I'm using nylon thread (from the fabric store--it's like fishing line) to hang them.  One great thing about these foam balls, as well as the covered balloon, is they are nice and light to hang.

 They will look great in Jay's room along with all the glow-in-the-dark stars we've been collecting. 
There may be a {little project} about constellations coming!