Materials List

Keep in mind, I purchased many of the felt materials pre-made, but you could definitely make them yourself and it would probably be cheaper. :)

“Soft” Materials
2 12”x18” Gray Easy Felt $0.79/each
1 9”x12” Summer Felt Rectangle $0.50
1 9”x12” Glimmer White Felt Rectangle $0.25
1 apple tree $4.50
1 package of felt flowers $4.50
1 package of felt leaves $4.50
1 spool conductive thread 234/34 4 ply $34.95
1 spool conductive thread 117/17 2 ply $39.95 Tip: You can purchase this spool only. I had access to both the 4 and 2 ply. I prefer the 4 ply for sewing the stitches, but the 2ply will work. You will need the 2ply to make your stroke sensor, so if you can only purchase one spool, make it the 2 ply.
1 package of felt star stickers (purchased at Hobby Lobby)
1 piece of neoprene (it should be the kind you would make wetsuit out of, it should be soft and spongy)
3 packages of different colored star buttons (purchased at Hobby Lobby)
1 package of Velcro dots (purchased at Hobby Lobby)
1 bottle of fabric glue (purchased at Hobby Lobby)
1 package of iron-on adhesive (purchased at Hobby Lobby)
Stretch conductive fabric OR aluminum foil

“Hard” Materials
1 LilyPad SimpleSnap Protoboard $29.95
1 LilyPad Arduino SimpleSnap $9.95
1 LilyPad Twinkle $6.95
1 LilyPad Tiny $6.95
1 LilyPad Buzzer $7.95
2 LilyPad Coin Cell Battery Holder – Switched $5.95/each
1 LilyPad Coin Cell Battery Holder $4.95
Lily Pad LEDs. I used red, blue, yellow, pink, and green. $4.95 for each package. You will get 5 lights per package.
1 LilyPad FTDI board $14.95
1 craft knife
1 needle (a thicker needle works best)
1 pair of scissors

Step 1: Glowing Apple Tree

Materials needed (from earlier list)
5 red LEDs
LilyTiny
Coin Cell Battery holder -- Switched.
Felt apple tree
Thread and needle
Fabric glue
Iron-on adhesive
1 12"x18" Gray Easy Felt
1 coin battery

Tips:
I chose to have my "hardware" sewn on to the back of the felt board, so they wouldn't be visible. However, your lights should be sewn on the front of the felt board.

I can't say this enough: make sure you draw out your circuits and make sure your orientation is correct. Your negative and positive lines can never cross, or you'll short out your circuit.

I've included a sketch of how the circuits would look from the back. All of the negative pins on the LEDs are facing up.

All of the negative pins should be sewn in parallel. It saves time. You will need quite a long piece of thread to do this step.

You want to use the "switched" battery holder, so you can turn the lights on and off. If you don't use a battery holder with an on/off switch, the LilyTiny will run until the battery is dead.

Steps:
1) Iron on the adhesive to your tree. When the tree is cool, iron on the tree to your felt board. Leave the apples for later.

2) Decide how you want your lights, LilyTiny, and battery holder to be arranged. You also need to decide how you want the light pattern to look. The LilyTiny has 4 pints (0-3) with different light functions. I chose to sew all of the lights to pin 2, but you can sew them to different pins and create different light effects. However, that will take up more space, because you won't be able to sew your positive pins in parallel.

3) Based off your decision in Step 2, draw your circuit diagram--check it twice! Again, your negative and positive lines can not cross.

4) Begin sewing on your LEDs. I started with the negative line first. Sew all negative LEDs in parallel. Each LED pin (hole) should have the thread going through it at least three times. This improves the flow of the current.

5) Once you have all the negative LEDS sewn, place your Lily Tiny on the back of the felt board, positioned about halfway down the trunk.

6) Sew from the last LED negative pin to the negative pin on the LilyTiny. Remember--sew through the pin three times.

7) Continue sewing to the negative pins on the battery holder. Knot off your thread.

8) Now, you will want to sew the positive pins of the LEDs. Thread your needle and begin sewing your positive pins together (again, the thread should be fairly long). Remember to follow your circuit diagram.

9) Once all of the positive pins are sewn, continue to the LilyTiny. You will want to sew to the number pin you decided on. I chose 2.

10) After you have sewn through your numbered pin, continue sewing to the positive pins on the battery holder. Knot off your thread.

11) I like to dab a tiny bit of fabric glue on my knots, to keep them from fraying.

12) Glue your apples on to the three, over your lights.

13) Place a battery in the holder, and switch it to on. Now, you have a glowing apple tree!

Photos
Glowing apple tree
Circuit diagram
Close up of a sewn LED
View of the sewn LilyTiny and the battery holder

Step 2: Twinkling Stars

Materials Needed
LEDs (I used 2 pink, 2 yellow, and 3 green
LilyTwinkle
Battery Holder -- Switched
Needle and Thread
Felt stars
Fabric glue
1 coin battery

Tips:
Draw out your circuit diagram. Make sure your positive and negative lines don't cross.

The LilyTwinkle has four pins (0-3) that do different twinkling effects. You will want to have your six lights going to different pins. For example, I did 2 lights to pin 0, 1 light to pin 1, 2 lights to pin 2, and 2 lights to pin 3. Remember, you sew the positive pins of the LEDs to the numbered pins on the LilyTwinkle.

You can sew your negative pins in parallel.

You want to use the "switched" battery holder, so you can turn the lights on and off. If you don't use a battery holder with an on/off switch, the LilyTwinkle will run until the battery is dead.

Steps:
1) Decide where you want your stars on the felt board. I did my stars in the shape of the Little Dipper.

2) Draw your circuit diagram.

3) Sew your negative LEDs in parallel. Continue the line from the negative LED pins to the negative pin on the LilyTwinkle, then to negative pin on the battery holder.

4) Sew your positive LED pins to their respective pins on the LilyTwinkle.

5) The positive pin on the LilyTwinkle should be sewn to the positive pin on the battery holder. In the photo included below, you can see I actually sewed this line underneath the LilyTwinkle to get to the battery holder. I accidentally boxed myself in. This is why it's so important to chart out everything in a circuit diagram. My solution still works, but I needed to sew very carefully to get it connected.

6) Glue your knots down. Where all the knots are so close together, this is an important step.

7) Stick the star stickers on the LEDs.

8) Place a battery into the holder and switch it on.

9) Now you have twinkling stars!

Photos:
Twinkling stars (all of the stars work, but they twinkle at different speeds)
Circuit diagram
Close up of the positive LilyTwinkle pin and the positive battery holder pin

Step 3: Musical Stars and Moon

Materials needed:
1 LilyPad SimpleSnap Protoboard
1 LilyPad Arduino SimpleSnap
1 LilyPad Buzzer
Star buttons
A moon cut out of the 9”x12” Glimmer White Felt Rectangle
Needle and thread
Fabric glue
LilyPad FTDI
Arduino program
Craft knife

Tips:

This is actually one of the easier ones to sew, but it is coding intensive. If you aren't familiar with reading music, you will need to find a tutorial on how to read sheet music.

The code is attached as a Text Editor file, because the website would not let me upload the actual Arduino file. Simply copy and paste into an new Arduino sketch.

Crafting Steps:
1) Draw your circuit diagram. You are going to want the following:
- A negative ground (so you don't need to be hooked up to the computer to play music). This means you will have a star sewn to the negative pin on the buzzer.
- A positive line from the Protoboard to the buzzer. This means one of the numbered pins (5, 6, 9, 10, or 11) will be sewn to the positive pin on the buzzer. You can not have the positive pin on the buzzer connected to an "A number" pin.
-Each star needs to be sewn to its own pin (can be either a number or an "A number" pin). I chose to have four stars, but you can have more or less, depending on your preference.

2) Cut out a moon and glue it to the felt board.

3) Sew the stars to their respective pins and the positive line from the Protoboard to the buzzer.

4) Now you are ready to code.

Coding Steps:
**The code I used is provided as a file. If you want to use the same code, you can simply open it up in Arduino and program it to your LilyPad. The instructions below are only if you want to use a different song. I would recommend still using the bones of the code I provided, because it has the integers and void loop setups in place. I have provided instructions in the code of what to delete if you want to use different songs.
1) Select any songs you would like to turn into code. I chose Brahms Lullaby, Twinkle Twinkle Star, The Cuckoo (a German folk song), and Clair de Lune. You can find sheet music online by doing a web search.

2) Once you have the songs you'd like to use, open up a text editor on your computer. It is easier to code this way than starting in Arduino.

3) Begin transposing your song. The buzzer can only play one sound at a time, so keep that in mind as you start to write the code. For example, if I were coding Brahms lullaby, here is how I would start it. The "//" and everything after it on the same line will gray out when you paste into Arduino. This will allow you to have notes or comments to help you remember what is happening in your code. If you are unfamiliar with musical notes, I would recommend doing a quick search on how to read music. It may be too much to figure out at once.

// Brahms Lullaby

//Start with E4

tone(speaker, E4, 300); //E4
delay(300);

E4 refers to the note on the sheet music, and the 300 is the delay , or the count of the note. The delays aren't precisely like a note on sheet music is. For example, in this song, a quarter note is a 300 delay, and a half note is a 600 delay. You'll likely need to play around with it to find the best delay for your song.

Let's look at a little more of the song:

// Brahms Lullaby

//Start with E4

tone(speaker, E4, 300); //E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, E4, 300); //E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, G4, 900); // G4
delay(900);
tone(speaker, E4, 200);// E4
delay(200);
tone(speaker, E4, 300); // E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, G4, 600); // G4
delay(600);

4) Once you have coded your song, you will need to replace the notes in the parenthesis with its frequency counterpart. You can find the frequencies listed here.

Here is the same section above, but with the frequencies added in:
// Brahms Lullaby

//Start with E4

tone(speaker, 329.63, 300); //E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, 329.63, 300); //E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, 392.00, 900); // G4
delay(900);
tone(speaker, 329.63, 200);// E4
delay(200);
tone(speaker, 329.63, 300); // E4
delay(300);
tone(speaker, 392.00, 600); // G4
delay(600);

The quickest way to make this change is to use the "Find and Replace" tool in your text editor. Make sure to leave the notes outside of the parentheses and after the "//" intact, in case you need to go back and make any changes. It is much easier to look at the actual note than the frequency number!

5) Once you have finished coding your song in the text editor, open up the attached code in Arduino. There are instructions in the code on what to leave in and what to replace if you have coded your own songs.

6) Program your Protoboard and Simple Snap.

7) Test the music by pressing the exposed thread on your buttons!

Photos:
The actual front
Circuit diagram of the front
Circuit diagram of the back
Screencapture of the transposing/coding process

Musical_Code.txt
Download

Step 4: Stroke Sensor Pond

Materials:
1 9”x12” Summer Felt Rectangle
1 package of felt flowers
1 package of felt leaves
1 spool conductive thread 234/34 4 ply
1 spool conductive thread 117/17 2 ply
1 LilyPad Coin Cell Battery Holder
1 Battery
Neoprene
Stretch conductive fabric OR aluminum foil
Iron on adhesive
Fabric glue
Velcro
1 12"x18" Gray Easy Felt board

Tips:
This is the easiest one to craft, but the hardest one to explain. There are a few “layers” to this project.

The bottom layer is the back of the gray felt board. This is where you will place the battery holder. Many of your stitches will also be on this layer.

The middle layer is the front of the gray felt. This is where you will sew your LEDs. You will place your pond over the LEDs as well.

The top layer is the neoprene stroke sensor. It will sit on top of the front of the gray felt board.

If you are using the aluminum foil, you will need to iron on the adhesive, then iron it on to the neoprene. It sounds strange, but it will work. The purpose is to have a conductive patch. Aluminum foil is much cheaper than conductive stretch fabric.

The reason you are using the battery holder without the on/off switch is so you can do the stroke sensor at will. Because the lights will only turn on when you activate the sensor, you don’t need to have a switch to turn the battery on and off.

Steps:
1) Follow this tutorial on how to make a stroke sensor. Tip: Even though this tutorial says you need two types of thread, you only need to use one type of thread, the 117/17 2 ply. I’ve made this sensor quite a few times, and I’ve only used this thread. It has worked every time.

2) Draw the circuit diagram.

3) Create the stroke sensor.

**Please note, you are not sewing your the stroke sensor to the gray felt. The only time the sensor should be connected to the gray felt is when the positive and negative lines are sewed to their respective conductive patches on the back of the neoprene.**

4) Sew the negative LED pins to the negative pin on the battery holder. Then, connect this same line to the farthest conductive patch. Tie a knot.

5) Sew your positive LED pins to the positive pin on the battery holder. Then connect this same line to the closest conductive patch. Tie a knot.

6) Cut a pond out of the Summer felt and create lily pads out of the felt flowers and leaves.

7) Glue down your knots.

8) Put a battery in the holder.

9) Stroke your sensor!

Finishing:
After I had everything put together on the board, I decided I wanted to cover the back of it. This would keep the hardware and stitches protected. Add the velcro dots to the back corners of the felt board with all of the circuits. Add velcro dots to the back of the blank gray felt board. Stick the blank gray felt board to the back of the felt board with the circuits. Now, you are ready to play with your musical and light up felt board!

Photos:
Stroke sensor and pond
LEDs under the pond
Circuit diagram