Phichit Chulanont Hamster Hats

The season finale of Yuri on Ice left me with many different emotions: happiness, contentedness, a bit of disappointment, hope for the next level.  But above all others: inspiration!

There is so much about this show that is praiseworthy.  The plot (and plot twists), the animation, the relateable characters, the healthy relationships.  This anime was a powerhouse from start to finish.  It's been a long time since something struck me so deeply.

In the finale, we got a peek into many of the skaters' minds as they performed.  I think I speak for the entire fandom when I say how sweet and perfect Phichit's inner monologue was.  He's such a bright ray of sunshine.  Optimistic.  Confident.  A skilled skater with a ton of potential.  I think the world needs more Phichits to brighten up the day!  His dream of having a skate show because he wants "everyone in Thailand to know how fun figure skating is" can't get anymore beautiful!

And those costumes!  So over the top!  I adore everything about that idea, and would love to see this in an OVA!

Moving on.  Phichit's imagination made me start thinking about the adorable hamster hats, and how easy they would be to make.  Of course, my version goes for ease over 100% correctness, so there are a few modifications from the ones the skaters wear in the ice show.

First, I started out with this template.  I've used it several times for many projects and love how functional and customizable it is.

I traced it onto a bronzeish-brown fleece fabric.

Then I cut two white rectangles for the cheeks of the hamster.

Next, I cut out two rounded pieces in brown for the ears.

They need to be folded over like this.

Then I added a white part in the center.

I used a blanket stitch to put them together.

I sandwiched the ears in between the two brown hat pieces and sewed both sides of the seam.

After that, I stitched shut the V on the top.

Next, I sewed the white rectangles together, right side to right side, along both short edges to form a band.

 I folded the band in half then sewed it to the brown part, right side to right side.

Since the hats are small (and my head is tiny), I folded the brim up.  This gave it a cuter, fluffier look.

Next, I got a piece of white fleece and sewed a line down the middle for teeth.

I cut out a nose and two eyes (and two white eye shimmers).

To save time and energy, I used a hot glue gun to attached all the added details.

And it's finished!  It took me about an hour!

Prinny Fleece Hat

I get to accompany my 6th graders to camp next week.  And because it'll be chilly for us, I offered to help the kids in class make personalized fleece hats for the trip.  A friend donated a ton of fleece to me, and I was so happy to put it to good use!

So, during lunch recess for the past two months or so, I've been helping the kids sew and design their hats.  They were very creative with their designs, too!  They chose everything from dogs, sheep, tigers, and cats, to Ninja Turtles, Dragon Ball Z, Legend of Zelda, and  Frozen.

And I finally finished my own hat for camp!  I decided to make a Prinny!



Prinny: A reincarnation of a human soul in Hell (the Netherworld) or Heaven (Celestia).  The Prinnies need to earning money to pay off their debts, their sins, before being reborn as humans again.

It's a character from the game Disgaea, a really awesome RPG for the Playstation 2--which was also re-released on the PSP and the Nintendo DS--and two games called "Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero?" and "Prinny 2: Dawn of Operation Panties, Dood!" for PSP.  (Though I hear that the Prinny shows up in all of Nippon Ichi games.)

The Prinnies are so pathetically cute!  When I got my new car in September, I named him Prinny, and I have a decal of the dancing Prinny on the back.  :D

Anyway, for my hat, I picked a dark blue, then glued on white eyes with black pupils and a yellow beak.



For extra depth I wanted to include their demon wings on the back.  I used my adhesive fabric to make them a bit more stiff.




I absolutely love it!  This picture is horrible, and doesn't do its cuteness justice!

 


~Buttons

Hogwarts House Scarf and Hat

Pockets is a very proud Hufflepuff, but it's hard to find nice Harry Potter things that aren't Gryffindor.  So, we're always on the look out for things we can make into Hufflepuff things (and Ravenclaw for me).  While at JoAnn a few days ago, I found a really cute gold and black argyle fleece.  And since I'm going to crazy making fleece hats, I'm enjoying working with the material.  And I thought it would be awesome to make Pockets a Hufflepuff hat and scarf!

So, the first thing I did was determine if I wanted the argyle diamonds to be horizontal or vertical:

Vertical

Horizontal

I decided that the vertical looked better, having the diamond's long points be up and down.  Then I had to decide if I wanted it to have two full gold diamonds, or two full black diamonds.

Black

Gold

I decided to go with the black.

I cut out two strips (the fabric was 60 inches wide).

Then I lined up where the diamonds met, and trimmed both edges.  Using clear quilting thread, I sewed the two edges together.

The seam is hardly noticeable!

Now, for the hat, I traced the pattern, again with the diamonds going vertically.

You cut a front and a back piece, then sew up the sides, right side to right side (see a more detailed tutorial on that here).  I left about an inch or an inch and half undone at the bottom, because I wanted to sew that seam on the outside, and fold up the brim.

Turn it ninety degrees, and sew up the little V that's still open.

This is the outside of the brim, with the seam on the inside.  (Does that make sense?)

And the final product:

It turned out so cute!  She really loved it when I gave it to her!

(This is me, trying it on.  I only wish they had the blue and bronze of Ravenclaw, and I'd made myself a set!)


~Buttons

How to Make Pikmin Hats

Pockets and I both enjoy gaming.  Most of the time, the games we like differ greatly.  However, there's one that we both have a passion for: Pikmin.  We aren't hardcore gamers, just recreational gamers, and we both agree that the first Pikmin (originally released on the GameCube) is too hard and scary.  I barely remember playing Pikmin 2 (also on the GameCube).  But, when I got my Wii U for Christmas, I just had to try Pikmin 3.

Needless to say, I fell in love with the game.  The controls are so simple, the storyline is interesting, the characters fun, and the Pikmin adorable!  There isn't a single thing I dislike about the game.  And this rekindled my love for the Pikmin franchise--so much so that I bought 1 and 2 on the Wii to give them another try; I am immensely enjoying 2 at the moment.

On to the point.  This past Friday, the Play Nintendo Tour came to a local mall.  To celebrate this, and to be a total nerd, I thought it would be a good idea to make fleece Pikmin hats.  It took some thought, but in the end, they weren't too difficult to put together.  In fact, they were quite easy!

So here's a list of materials you'll need:
Roughly 1/3 yard of fleece in the color of your Pikmin
Green fleece
Batting or poly-fil
Hat pattern (I got mine here)

The green fleece is for the leaf at the end of their stem.  If you want to do a bud, you'll need white/pink/purple (depending on which Pikmin color you choose) and green.  If you want a flower, you'll need white/pink/purple and yellow.  Also, for the flower--and I'll mention this later--you may need an adhesive fabric.

The first thing to do is decide which color Pikmin you want.  Each has different traits that you can embellish on your hat:

Red has a pointy nose
Blue has a pink mouth
Yellow has big years
Rock has jagged edges
Pink has wings
Purple has feelers
White has red eyes (I didn't include eyes on any of the others, but since it's what distinguishes the Whites, I would include it on this one)

So far, I've completed 5 of the 7--with plans to finish the other 2 this week.

This will go step by step with how I created the hats.  I won't divide it by color, rather, I'll show the different ways to add the embellishments as we go along.

Step 1:  Pattern

I searched endlessly on Pinterest until I found a pattern that would work for my purposes.  I mentioned it in the list of materials, but I'll post it again.  It's called the Halloween Hat Pack from FleeceFun.com.  This site has a wonderful video tutorial which really helped when I was attaching the stem.  They also have a free pattern you can print off, in many different sizes.

I printed off the large adult, even though my head is tiny.  I figured I could always take the material in if necessary.

So, print out the pattern and pin it to the color of fleece you're using.  You'll want to have it folded, so you cut out two pieces at once--a front and a back.

 

With your two pieces together, right side to right side, sew up each side to the top V.

 
(You can see here I wanted to add a brim to the Blue Pikmin hat.  So I cut off the bottom inch and sewed it back on.)

Set this part aside for the moment.  We'll come back to it later. 

Step 2: Make the Stem

This part can get a bit tricky, depending on how much effort you want to put forth.  Making a stem with a leaf was incredibly easy.  However, for variety, I wanted to make a bud and a flower (because we all know that flower Pikmin are the best!).  

But first, we need to make a pattern for the stem.  I drew this freehand on a piece of paper, making sure I made it as long as I needed, in relation to the hat I had already cut out.  


 


I don't think it needed to be so wide at the bottom, but it didn't hinder the design either.

So, put the pattern on your fabric (again, we want to have two layers for a front and a back).  Pin it and cut it out.

Do the same thing for a leaf, keeping the size consistant with all the other parts.  Cut out a front and a back as well.

 



















































To make a front and a back, we want our fabrics to be mirror images of each other.  So take one stem and place the leaf on top.  Take the other stem, and make the leaf a mirror image to the first.  Put the leaves face down (so the stem and leaf are facing each other right side to right side), then sew a straight stitch across.

 

If you want, you can add some decorative stitches on the leaves to give them a bit more detail.  It didn't take long, and it turned out very cute, I think.

Now, with front and back complete, put them together, right side to right side, and sew all along the edges, leaving only the bottom open. 




Flip it inside out and stuff it with batting/poly-fil.


 

I added a bit of wire, to try to get it to stand up, but it didn't work very well.

 

For the bud, make a pattern that is a pointed oval.  You'll want to cut out four of these on the color of fleece you need.  (Yellow, Blue, and Red Pikmin have white buds; Purple and White Pikmin have pink buds; Rock and Pink Pikmin have purple buds.  You can find images easily using a search engine.) 



Sew the pieces together, right side to right side, and you'll get a bud!



From here, my sewing machine was useless.  The fabric was too thick to sew through.  A fancier machine might be able to do it, but mine couldn't.  I had to sew by hand.  So I took a few pieces of green fabric and sewed them around the bottom edges to be the leaves.

Then, complete the stem as above, EXCEPT you leave the top and bottom open.  Sew along both sides, then turn the stem inside out.  Hand stitch the bud to the top opening, and then stuff with batting. 

And now the most difficult: the flower. 

While at Joann buying more fleece, I was talking with the cutting counter worker.  She asked what I was making and I explained, and she gave me a great idea for making the flowers!  Using Pellon Peltex 2, a double sided, very stiff, adhesive fabric!



So I cut out white half-circles for the petals.



I put five of them in a circle with a yellow middle.



Then I cut out the Peltex and sandwiched it between another layer of all white.  I ironed them together (as the directions say) and then trimmed off the extra Pletex and bottom layer.  For sewing it onto the stem, I hand stitched five little stitches in the center of flower.

Using this method, It was actually easier than the bud.

Step 3: Attach the Stem

Taking the main hat fabric that we put aside, turn it sideways so the seam we sewed is in the center.

 

Flip the hat inside out, keeping the seam in the center.  Now, take the stem and turn it sideways, so the seams are in the center.   Pinch it flat, so the seams touch.


 

Now, place the stem inside the hat, and line up the seams.

 

Straight stitch across and trim off the extra fabric.

 

Step 4: Adding Embelishments

Rock: 

For the Rock Pikmin, I simply stitched on decorative lines, giving it a jagged look.



 






Blue:

 

I just added on a pink triangle on the brim of the hat.


(And of course, I took the picture before I put on the mouth.)


Red:



For the Red, I cut out a pointy nose (front and back) and sewed them together.  Stuff with batting.

 

Attaching it was pretty easy.  I made a horizontal slit in the very front of the hat, right around the brim.  With the hat inside out, I stuck the nose into the hat, with the opening on the outside, then sewed it shut (just as we did with the stem).






Yellow:



Yellow's ears are huge!  So, what I did was make a pattern for the ears, again, keeping in mind the size to the hat.  In fact, I think the ears are a bit too big.

So, with the pattern, you want to cut out 2 ears, each with a front and a back (4 pieces total).  I also added a bit of a darker yellow to the center to give the ears some contrast.  You'll only need 2 of those pieces, as they are only on the front.

Sew the darker pieces to the front of the ears--making sure that the ears will be mirror images of each other.  Remember, one goes on the right side, one goes on the left.  Then, put the front and back together, right side to right side, and sew along both sides, leaving the bottom open.

 

With the ears, you need to do it before we stitch the hat together.  Put the ears inside the hat, with a bit of the open end sticking out.  Then sew up both sides to the V.

 




Pink:



For the Pink, I had to add wings.  I hand drew a pattern for a circular type wing.  Like the ears, you'll need a front and back for each wing--4 pieces total.



Sew them together, leaving the straight edge open for stuffing.

Similar to attaching the Red's nose, I cut two vertical slices on the back of the hat for the wings.  With the hat inside out, stick the smaller side of the wing through the slit (with the wing inside the hat) and sew it together.  Cut off the extra fabric.






 And here's a few pictures from the actual event.  We had a lot of fun!

Here's mine and Pocket's mom in the Yellow hat:

 

And I wore the Pink because it was my favorite!

 


~Buttons