Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy Yondu Odonta light up Mickey Ears tutorial

Happy Father's Day to all the Daddy's out there!

Any fans of the Marvel universe will know that the "Best Dad in the Universe" belongs to Yondu Odonta, the funny looking blue guy from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 1 and 2. I lost my own father to cancer this year, so to help others celebrate this father's day, I'm posting my most recent project, light up Yondu Mickey Ears! (I think my Dad would have liked them). And I'll be taking them to Disneyland soon to ride the Guardians of the Galaxy for the first time!

I couldn't find any Yondu Mickey Ears on any websites, which I was surprised about. It seems like such a cool design to create! (Plus I love his character!) To explain for anyone who doesn't know who Yondu is, he is the adoptive father of Peter Quill, and he can control a glowing red arrow with his whistle. Pretty cool, huh?

I started by looking at my other ears to get an idea of how large to build the red "fin".

It was really easy and fun to recreate the design of the fin. I used a soldering iron because my wood burning tool is still in all the supplies from the recent steampunk festival I went to. It worked great. (Don't breathe the fumes!)

I first painted the fin brown to give it a dark look, then brought the color back to a bright red with a few coats of paint.

Next it was on to creating the ears. I measured some rose gold Mickey Ears I got at Disneyland in February... I used brown material because I'm just going to paint it anyway, and it would have been hard to find "Yondu Blue" fabric at Hobby Lobby...

...and cut out four pieces. A few friends stopped by to check the progress...

I then sewed them together and got a little help with small hands to fill them with fiberfil. (Note: I should have measured a little differently, because they are smaller than I would have preferred! Oh well!)

Acrylic paint works pretty well when painting fabric, and helps keep the ears sitting up stiffer.

Next on to the glow stick mounting. I used thin air hose from a hardware store, and used my 3D printing pen to mount it to the headband. The 3D printing filament is significantly stronger than a hot glue gun, so it would not come off.

I had to make a few points where the glow stick would attach to the ears to get the appearance of the arrow winding back and forth...

I used a different filament color to 3D print the tip of the arrow. I was glad I had gold!

I finished off the arrow by 3D printing some red filament around the base of the arrow to simulate the effect it has.

I had to get creative with the last curve in the glow stick. I used fishing line to attach the arrow piece with the one below to get a sharp curve. Now I can put in a new glow stick in the ears each night without damaging the ears. I'm super excited to take them to the park soon!

Do you have a favorite pair of Mickey Ears? Would you like to see me try and make another kind? Let me know in the comments below if you have any ideas of what I should do next, and Happy Father's Day to all the Daddy's out there!