Needle-felted light up Prince of All Cosmos

Katamari Damacy is a fantastical Japanese video game in which you play the Prince of All Cosmos, a little green guy with an antenna-bearing oblong head and an aptitude for gathering large agglomerations of miscellaneous stuff onto a ball (the Katamari) that you roll around the world.

This needle felted figure of the Prince of All Cosmos has an embedded soft circuit - squeeze his tummy, and the red LED at the tip of his antenna lights up. He goes together quickly, and is a great way to dip your toes into the world of eTextiles.

Oh, and if you like needle felting and Katamari Damacy, you should check out the book I Felt Awesome by Moxie - she has instructions for a fantastic felted magnetic Katamari game.

Needle-felted Prince of All Cosmos from Shannon Henry on Vimeo.

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Step 1: Materials

Tools:

Felting Needles - 1 coarse, 1 fine. Lots of yarn shops carry felting supplies, and of course they are also available online.
Scissors
Sewing needle - conductive thread is relatively coarse, so a larger-eyed needle is a good idea.
Foam block for felting - this is antistatic foam, but a block of styrofoam works too. I think the antistatic foam lasts better, and I think it makes sense when electronics are involved, but felting blocks can also be a great way to get some reuse out of packaging styrofoam if you have some around.
Awl, skewer, or tapestry needle (not pictured) - just something to help enlarge holes... even an unbent wire hanger could work
Needle-nosed pliers (not pictured)

eTextile components:

Small 3v coin cell battery - this is a CR1216
3mm Red LED
Conductive thread - 1 foot
Conductive fabric/tape - I use a conductive fabric tape from lessemf.com, but conductive fabric such as you can purchase form sparkfun or aniomagic would also work well. You can make this without the conductive fabric, but the battery holder is likely to end up more finicky if you do.

Other Materials:

Apple green wool roving, 1 oz - you may only need 1/2 oz, but I prefer to have extra just in case
Small amounts of wool roving in lilac, gold, red, black, ivory, lime green, kelly green, forest green (not pictured)
2 pipe cleaners