[monotonous] "I got you an official Bender hat."

The Brain Slug is one of my favorite creatures on Futurama, and quite possibly one of the easiest and most fun Halloween costumes I've done in a while. What's not fun about talking in a monotone voice, and if it falls off your head you can loudly exclaim, "I'm free of that nightmare!"

You'll need a few hours of time, and a basic knowledge of sewing to complete this cute little Brain Slug plushie.

Step 1: Materials and Pattern

Materials:

Fleece (bright green)
Black and White scraps for the eye
Green thread
Pins
Scissors
Needle
Sharpie marker
Sewing Machine (optional)
Printer (for the pattern)
Stuffing (Poly-Fill)

Cutting the Pattern:

When you print out the pattern be sure that you don't shrink the image in any way. The image is already sized to 8.5 x 11, and reducing the size to "fit to margin" or anything like that will make things smaller than we want. Once you have the pattern printed out and cut up, you need to cut out some fleece for your Brain Slug.

You'll need:

(14) Feets
(1) Bottom
(2) Side Piece
(4) Antenna

Brain Slug Pattern.pdf
Download

Step 2: Antennae and Feets

Start out by sewing two pieces of the Antenna together by using an overcast stitch. These are really skinny, and we wont be able to flip them inside out, so I decided to use that stitch since it's somewhat decorative, and I just like how it looks. I did the same thing for the Feets, except I wound up flipping those. These should all be done by hand, since they're so small.

Once you're done, you should wind up with a pair of Antenna for the Slug, and seven little nubby feet thingies (which I will still call Feets).

Step 3: Putting It Together

Grab the Bottom and lay out the seven Feets in a circle, (facing inwards) lining them up with the outside edge. Next you need to pin each of the Side Piece sections on top of the Feets and Bottom. Each one of the Side Piece sections will only make slightly more than halfway around the Bottom, so try to line it up. Once you have all of the pieces pinned in place, sew it, attaching the Bottom, Feets, and bottom of the Side Piece sections. I used my machine for this part.

If you flip it "right-side out" like I did in the last picture, be sure to flip it back to the way it was (inside-out).

Step 4: Antennae and Final Seam

Grab the two Antenna you finished earlier and pin them to one Side Piece on the inside. Then you need to pin the two sides of the Side Piece sections together. Once you have it pinned in place, sew along the edge (I used my machine) making sure to leave an opening.

You need to leave about a two inch hole so we can flip the Brain Slug inside out, stuff it, and give it an eye.

Step 5: The Eye

You can make the eye just about any way you want. The animators from Futurama seem to switch between a circle eye and a pinched circle, but you could do just about anything. I chose to find a small circular based object and traced it on a scrap of white fleece I had. After cutting it out I affixed a black pupil I sourced from another tiny scrap of black fleece.

Find a good spot to place it on your Brain Slug. Then pin, and hand sew it on.

Step 6: Fill and Finish!

When stuffing the Brain Slug be sure not to over-stuff, or else the bottom will be convex instead of concave, and will not sit on anyone's head properly. You could fill it with most anything. The most common stuffing is Poly-Fill (a polyester based toy stuffing), and if you buy a bag at Joann or something you'll have enough to make quite a few more.

Once you have your Brain Slug filled up with a desirable amount of stuffing you'll need to close up that last seam using a ladder stitch.

As for attaching it to your head, and wearing it around. I'll leave that up to you and your own personal preferences. You could have a string that goes under your chin, attach it to a hairband, use bobby pins or hair clips, etc.

Thanks for reading!