Hey Na,
Just started reading this thread. IS this competition for the ones that you sent the free pattern to? I received the head, mouth, and torso, I was waiting on the other segments before I started on mine, but I already have it sketched out. If this is the pattern that you will be judging on, do you have all of your contestants lined up or can late to the game guys like me still get in on it?

Just found out that a friend of mine was killed in a car accident coming home last night. Another vehicle ran a red light and t-boned him. He had just turned 18 right before mother's day and just graduated last week. Aaron was an awesome person and puppeteer. His family need all the prayers they can get. We want to honor his memory, but not sure how to do it. There was one character puppet that he was the only one that did it. Feedback on this idea would be greatly appreciated. We were thinking about stuffing the puppet and retiring it to make a tribute to the voice that was silenced.
You never know when its your time, so everyone please cherish your life. Tell those you love that you love them, blow off minor hurts because life is too short to concern ourselves with pettiness.

The outside of a foam puppet is easy to take care, you could go as far as to scotch guard them too if needed, but what you need to look out for is moisture on the inside of the puppet. This is where your mildew is going to grow.

Copyright is a slippery slope in some cases. Just because you say that you created something doesn't mean that you did. The issue with copyright is to be able to prove that something is yours.
We have all seen the calvin and hobbs knock offs on the back of truck windows where calvin is doing unsanitary functions on ford symbols, college mascots, etc. This is not copyright enfringement because they change it just enough to say that it isn't Calvin. If you create a character that resembles kermit the frog, there is no copyright on the puppet itself, so if your intent is not to create a Kermit puppet, then you are not in violation. However, the character of Kermit is a trademark and, should your puppet look like kermit and have a name like Hermit the frog (Kermit's brother) then you would be in violation of trademark. Just creating something in today's society doesn't neccessarily mean that you own it. Someone else could say that they created it and if you can't legitimately prove that you created it before them, they can then sue you for copyright infringement on your own creation. Also, if someone likes a character that you have created and they find out that you do not have a trademark or copyright on it, then they can jump through the neccessary hoops to get a trademark or copyright on your creation and it now becomes theirs because they have the copyright and you do not. This doesn't happen too often, but it can. Many industries have done this to "aquire". Even in my main industry of engraving, laser engravers have been designing on brick for years and about 8 years ago, a company decided to take out a copyright on the process, so now other engravers have to pay for licensing to use a laser for engraving on brick. You do not need an official copyright, but you need to have the ability to prove that it is yours should something arise. Heaven forbid you are doing a show somewhere and someone in the audience takes your character and makes a t.v. show out of it and they make millions and then turn around and tell you that you have to stop using your creation in your show because it is too close to the character that they have.

I have looked and can't seem to find an old thread on here showing how to make a mechanical hand. I am working on a puppet that has thin arms but needs one of its hands to have articulated fingers. I know I have seen one on here, but can't find it. Am I going crazy? 

I bet they were puppet charactures of the Beetles. That is what that pic reminded me of are pics of the girls at Beetle's concerts.

http://swazzle.com/swazzleworkshop0.html
Swazzle has some really easy ones like the toilet paper roll robot, etc. and this site also gives video instructions on how to do them, so it may give you some ideas on how to present the contruction as well.