How to make your very own PEPPERMINT BUTLER!

For those of you who are not familiar, Peppermint Butler is the loyal butler to Princess Bubblegum in the popular series Adventure Time.  The show has a bunch of great characters, so I thought it would be fun to dress up as Princess Bubblegum for Halloween. After working on the dress and the crown for my costume, I got the idea to create a Peppermint Butler purse.  I'm going to fill it with bubblegum and peppermints :)

It was a bit time consuming, but still really easy to make dear old Pepp.  What takes time is waiting for all of that glue to dry ;)

The first thing you need to do is draw a circle.  You can really make your Butler any size.  Mine was about 8 inches in diameter.  Cut out about 4 circles of the same diameter using regular printer paper.

Now, use a cereal box or some sort of flimsy cardboard, take the circle you cut out from printer paper and trace it over your cardboard, and cut a circle out of the cardboard.  Do this two times.

Next up, cut out two more pieces of cardboard as pictured below, it can be any width.  I chose 3.5 inches.  It worked out pretty nicely as far as peppermint proportions go...

Tape the two pieces together.

Little by little, start taping your long straight piece to your cardboard circle. Tape the inside too for extra support...

If you desire, you can line the inside of your purse.  I had some purple felt left over from making the Princess' lapels so that is what I chose to use.  you can line it with any color, really...

After it is all lined, finish taping both sides of the box...

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Before the felt goes on, you're going to cover the cardboard with those white printer paper circles you made earlier.  That way, the cardboard and tape and ugly stuff doesn't show through...

Below you see I've applied the felt to the front and the paper to the sides.  The glue is on top there and I'm just about to put the felt on top...(P.S. use this glue, it is AWESOME)

After that you slowly start bringing him to life using different color felts.  Its helpful to have those extra cut outs of the printer paper so that you can measure how wide to make his clothes and so on...

His arms and legs were a bit tricky.  to make them, I rolled a piece of felt up with a wire I got from a craft store.  In other words, there is a wire in his legs and arms so you can bend them. I sewed the felt up and added the cuffs on the end to hide the imperfections.  

I made his hands and feet the same way...  I will tell you how I did the hand so you get the idea...I drew a 1 dimensional hand on felt and cut that pattern out 4 times.  I sewed two of the pieces together and stuffed them with left over felt to give it some dimension.  I placed the hands into the cuffs and using white thread, sewed the unseen part of the hand into the white cuff.  You can't really see it and it keeps the hand on the arm really well.  You basically use the same idea for the feet except that the feet go over the leg and you use red thread to sew it to the leg...

So, for those of you wondering how I attached the appendages onto the body, I'll tell ya.  I sewed the arms and legs into the cardboard! It wasn't all that easy.  You are basically blindly trying to find the perfect spot for your needle to go, and it takes a couple of times to get it right.  On top of that, pushing a needle through cardboard, albiet flimsy cardboard, HURTS yo' fingas!  Be sure to have a thimble handy to protect those digits...

Here is the finished product...My Peppermint Butler glamour shoot!

Ahh! Cat hair on his feets!

Kinda need to do some last minute glue touch ups, but I ran out of glue!!

UPDATE:   I got some cord from a fabric store and put two holes at the top and turn Mr. Butler into a purse! That way he will always be at my side ;)  Here is a photo of me in my halloween costume with my butler purse!!