Bumper Pokemon: Gastly

For our second bumper pokemon, we decided to do Gastly!  In my opinion, Gastly came out MUCH better than Jigglypuff, partly because this wasn't our first rodeo, and partly because we picked much more suitable fabric for Gastly, which helped to hide seam lines.

For Gastly, we used a minky black fabric (purchased on Amazon) for the base.  To attach it, we cut it into panels, to match the panels on the ball:

This was a rough-cut pattern, slightly bigger than the ball panels, and worked out perfectly

Here you can get a better idea for how the panels work together.  I attached the center of the panels using spray adhesive, but did not use spray adhesive on the edges, to avoid ugly glue marks in the event the spray got everywhere

Just another angle of the panels.  I cut them longer than need be so I could fold the bottom edge under.

 After using spray adhesive to get the center of each panel glued down, I used a hot glue gun for the edges, being careful not to let the gun get too hot (it will pop the ball).  in gluing down the edges of the panels, I cut small darts where necessary to avoid wrinkles.  This fabric hides stuff like that really well due to the fact that it is a very short pile fur.

Panels are glued!  The bottom edge was not glued to the inside yet.  Jigglypuff watched with approval.

Next, it was time to make Gastly's eyes.  For the eyes, I bought photo matting from a local craft store, and then cut it into the right shape.  To figure out proportion (and mark the ball for later) I used duck tape and pipe cleaners placed on the ball.  I measured the pipe cleaners after placing them, and then made my eyes to match that size. 

Measuring Gastly Eyes and marking the ball

 For the pupils, I decided I wanted to have the option of changing them out, so I glued a piece of velcro to the eyes, and then cut out a round pupil, and a curved, smiling eye shape out of cardboard.  I covered the cardboard in the minky black fabric and glued velcro to the bottom. 

Voila!  Changeable eyes with minimal effort!

 To place the eyes, I simply used hot glue and went to town. 

Those suckers aren't going anywhere!

 For Gastly's mouth, I used red and white felt.  To keep the mouth from curving under too much, I placed a small piece of foam along the bottom edge, which propped the felt up.  We glued a small strip of fabric onto the exposed foam after the mouth was glued on.  

All in all, I am thrilled with how Gastly came out!

Bumper Pokemon Take Two: Jigglypuff's Hairdo

I decided to rework the Jigglypuff hairdo for MTAC, since I was never pleased with how the helmet came out.  I think the reworked hairdo is a huge improvement on the original design!

To cover up my head, I decided on a large hood shape.  This was pretty simple.  I folded a piece of pink fleece in half and cut it into a large square, drew my hood shape, cut along every part but the fold seam, and sewed.  In making this hood, I found this tutorial extremely useful!

As you can see above, the front silhouette is much improved already!

The next step in getting this hairdo right was making a swirly poof for Jiggly's forehead.  To do this, I simply free-handed the poof shape on a folded piece of pink fleece, and cut it out.  I made sure to draw it larger than it needed to be, to allow for a seam when I sewed.  I then sewed the two sides, leaving about a hand's width un-sewn to allow me to stuff it.  Once it was sewn, I flipped the pillow inside out and stuffed it full of stuffing.  Once it was sufficiently stuffed, I sewed the last bit together.  The poof will be held on with a large velcro strip.

I then moved on to stuffing the hood, to give the hairdo a more rounded out appearance.  I trimmed the edges of the hood down so it would fit onto the body better, and then loosely pinned the edges (this was to help keep the stuffing from falling out, in addition to giving me a sew line later).  I then stuffed the hood and tried it on:

Not wonderful from the back, which is partially because I had some issues getting the fabric onto the ball in the first place, but it could certainly be worse.  I think we will have fewer issues with future bumper pokemon.

Now, we just needed to hide my face a bit better, which was accomplished by adding a vision screen.  To make the vision screen, I took a roll of window screening purchased at Home Depot, cut it to shape, sprayed it with primer, and then spray painted it pink.  The final results were pretty good!