Halloween is just a week away and the perfect time to shop for headband hats. Or maybe shop a day or two after Halloween for the sales. These cute, tiny hats are available at seasonal costume shops, thrift stores and dollar stores. Most are about $7-$12, but you can find them at dollar stores too. The best part is that the small hats are a perfect fit for most of my animal puppets.

If you’re having a challenge creating a character for your puppet, sometimes a hat is a great starting point. It’s surprising how much the personality of the puppet can change just by plopping a hat on its head.

How do you add a headband hat to your puppet? First, remove the headband from the hat. You might think the headband would fit well over your hand to keep the hat in place, but it doesn’t work too well. Plus the bands are unsightly unless you’re going for that look. Then you need to secure the hat to your puppet. I don’t recommend gluing the hat to your puppet, just in case you want to switch up costumes for different characters using the same puppet. The fabric/felt hats can be sewn onto the puppet with a few quick stitches. For the plastic hats, glue felt or fabric to the bottom of the hat first before sewing to your puppet. For a super quick fix, you can use safety pins to secure the hat in place.