Fish Hat Tutorial

I finally had time to put together the fish hat tutorial for you all.  I think it's a great hat and really you could probably make all kinds of different animals for hats by using this basic hat shape.  All the kids that tried the hat on loved it.  You may need to make it bigger or smaller depending on the child's head size.

Materials:
1/2 yard Fleece Fabric - main color
1/4 yard Fleece Fabric - accent color
2 " strip of Velcro
Coordinating thread
Fiber fill
Google Eyes


The pattern is available through Scribd.  If you are printing in Adobe Acrobat Reader, please make sure page scaling is set to NONE in the print menu. 


Fish Hat Pattern


Lay out the fabric and cut out the pattern pieces for the hat.

Then cut out the fins, tail, lips on the accent color.

I used the main color on the fins, tail and lips too.  You just need to cut the same pieces out slightly larger than you did on the accent color.  Then you will sandwich it in between the accent color. I'm letting you know ahead of time though that it gets tough to sew through that many layers of fleece.  So you might want to use felt.

Start sewing the tail pieces together.  Do the same with the fins and lips. Stuff the tail and fins with fiber fill.

Next we will start assembling the hat.  Sew 2 of the quadrant pieces together, then sew the other 2 together.

Now place the tail and top fin on the inside with the right sides together.  Pin and sew together.

Flip the hat out and sew the lips to the front.

 

Sew the fins on the side.  Center middle of fins with side seam and sew.

Sew two pieces of the ear flaps together and turn right side out. Repeat for the other side.

Attach side flaps to sides of the hat.  Center the middle of the flap with the side seam of the hat and sew in place.

Sew fleece lining together.  Leave a 2" gap in the top between where the top fin and back fin are on the hat.  This will allow you to pull it through at the very end.

Pin lining to fish hat with right sides facing each other.  It will look like a ball when you are doing this step.

Sew together.

Turn inside out by pulling through the hole you left in between the tail and top fin.  Whipstich the opening closed. Tack lining to hat.

Cut a 2" piece of velcro or longer depending on size of the child's head.  Attach to flaps.

Glue on the google eyes.  I used hot glue to glue them on.  Now you're done!