How to Make a Hyena Hat

Use images of hyenas as models for your hat.

If you’re searching for your next bold fashion statement, try a hyena hat. Animal hats are always adorable to wear, and kids especially enjoy donning them on cold winter mornings or during dress-up play time. It’s easy to find kitty, puppy or frog hats, but hyenas are an animal you don’t see every day in the fashion world. Their lovely spotted coats make for an attractive hat pattern that will make you stand out in a crowd.

Things You'll Need

• Tape measure
• Paper
• Pencil
• Scissors
• Gold or yellow fleece
• Fabric marking chalk
• Straight pins
• Needle
• Gold or yellow thread
• Fabric paint
• Craft paint brush
• 2 large googly eyes
• Black pom pom
• Hot glue gun

Instructions

1. Measure around the head of the person who is going to wear the hat using a tape measure. The measuring tape should go over the eyebrows and slope down past the ears and around the back of the head, just above the nape of the neck.

2. Divide the number in half, then add 2 inches. Cut a piece of paper to a perfect square, the sides measuring the number you calculated.

3. Fold the paper in half and set it on the table in front of you like a closed book or a greeting card, with the folded edge to the left.

4. Locate the mid-point on the right edge and label it point A. Locate the mid-point on the top edge of the folded paper and label it point B. Trace a line, slightly curving outward toward the upper-right corner, from point A to point B. Cut along the line and discard the upper right corner. When you cut, you should be cutting through both layers of paper. Open the paper and you should have a rough upside-down dome shape.

5. Place the dome shape template on a piece of golden or mustard-yellow fleece. Trace around the template with a chalk fabric marker. Move the template to another section of the fleece and trace around it again. Cut out the two dome-shaped pieces of fleece.

6. 

   Use a leaf shape like this as a template.

   Draw a leaf shape on a piece of paper, about 6 inches long from end to end. Cut it out. Trace two leaf shapes onto brown fleece and cut out the shapes.

7. Put one yellow fleece dome on the table with the right side of the fabric facing up. The flat side should be facing you and the dome side facing away from you.

8. Lay one brown leaf shape on each side of the dome with the right sides of the fleece up. Adjust the leaf shapes so they are each on a 45-degree angle, like a “V” shape, the rounded ends of each leaf pointing down and inward toward each other. The other two pointed tips should be pointing up and away from each other, overlapping off the rounded edges of the dome by about 2 inches.

9. Lay the second piece of fleece right side down on top to cover most of the brown leaf shapes and match with the edges of the bottom dome. The 2-inch tips of the leaf shapes should be sticking out past the rounded edges. Pin around the perimeter, securing the leaf shapes where they are. Stitch around the entire dome, about 1/2-inch from the edges, except for the bottom straight. Trim off the 2 inches of the brown leaf shapes so they are flush with the rounded edges of the dome.

10. Turn the hat right-side out. The brown leaf shapes that were inside should now stick out like ears. Paint spots at random on the hat using brown fabric paint and allow the paint to dry. Hot-glue two googly eyes and a black pom-pom nose to the front of the hat to make the hyena face.