Kintri's Mermaid Brooch

This is my contribution for the SewUseful Contest.
Here's the link to Etsy!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=6057456

How to make a cute merfairy or mermaid to hang on your bag, phone or anywhere else. Makes a great gift!

Get the template for the mermaid at this great dollmaking website:
Runo's Dollmaker

She's Jap (I think) but her site is English.

I'll be making a separate instructable on the making of the wings =).

Using the template, cut on the pieces of the mermaid. I used
a beige cloth I bought from Spotlight just for making dolls. Any non-stretch materials should work and you can also use jersey cloth (T-Shirt material) for the doll (Which is recommended by Runo).

I used the baby mermaid patterns for my doll.

Sew the doll (by hand since its so small) along the dotted
line and stuff with cotton or polyester filling.

Add the face by using a permanent (not water based as it will
wash off) marker and carefully draw the face on. You have to
watch out for bleeding ink which can ruin the face. My first dolls
were drawn with water based ink which went haywire when it touched
water.

I use polyfil from Spotlight to stuff the body. I tried cotton, but it made the doll a little bulky and uneven (like tumors! U). Use a hidden stitch to close up the openings.

Join the head to the body and attach the tail. For the tail, just cut out the tail shape and sew or glue it onto the body.

Use a piece of scrap cloth from old projects just lying around.
I had some scrap glittery gauze and used that for the tail.
Cut the tail fin shape out and glue it to the base with PVA.
Then using PVA glue, wrap the longer scrap around the lower half of the body and totally cover the tail end.

I used DMC cross stitch threads for the hair, but you
can use anything you want. I made two loops. One is longer
and one is shorter for the fringe.Sew the shorter one on
then sew the longer loop over the top.

You can add glue to the base of the fringe to make it stick.

Use glue to arrange the 'hair' to your satisfaction =)

You can use a chain instead of adding a brooch!

To add the chain, just sew it down to the head.
Just use your own creative energy to personalize your dolls!