A soot sprite

These are soot sprites, fictional creatures invented by Hayao Miyazaki. They are called susuwatari in Japanese and in My Neighbor Totoro they are referred to as dust bunnies. In Spirited Away, they eat kompeito, a kind of Japanese sweet that's made out of sugar. Yum!

These sprites live in abandoned houses because they love dark places. They are only seen when they move from a dark area to a lighter one. When crushed, they become dust.

Here is a picture of my susuwatari (isn't he adorable?):


I found a guide for making it on Instructables.com, if you're interested...