Sprite Stitch Board!

My current paper bookmark has seen better days and I want something more durable. I came up with my idea and tried to pattern it but gave up after a few futile and unsatisfying attempts. So I leave my idea in the hands of experts.

I scoured the internet to find images of the characters I want on the bookmark and arranged them as best as I could and have linked it. In case you can't decipher it, the general idea is to have a piranha plant border (joined at the corners, no pipe) with mouths straight toward the center of the sides, top, and bottom. Between the mouths are a koopa troopa (top), goomba (bottom), bob-omb (right), and boo (left). I know there are a lot of versions of these characters, but I would like them to be SMB 3. In the middle of the the bookmark are three marios (from top to bottom): in a boot, frog (facing forward), and tanooki statue. As I'm sure you can guess, I would like the images to be the correct size. I know my image is hardly proportional. Hopefully my description makes sense.

There are two other things. 1) I am terrible at colors so if you could also provide a color chart, it would be appreciated. 2) I need to know the best way to handle the edges of the aida cloth (18). Either a walkthrough or a link to another thread on the board would be appreciated as well. After all, I don't want the bookmark to unravel.

Thank you in advance and I look forward to the pattern and your help. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Some simple math will show you that this is going to be a *huge* bookmark if you want all the sprites to be made at a 1 pixel : 1 stitch ratio.
Most Aida cloth is 12, 14, or 16 squares per inch - a koopa is roughly 25 pixels/stitches tall which means he will be 1.78" (25 pixels/14 stitches per inch) tall. The Pirana plants are even taller.

Shrinking sprites means losing details. Sprites are by definition small characters, with very little room for proportional alteration. Very simple sprites, like NES ones, have so little detail that shrinking them effectively means redrawing them. This is a lot to ask someone to do. If you are ok with this being a larger project then I think you're request is fine otherwise you may want to rethink having this as a bookmark.

Points well taken, Kuja.girl. I wasn't sure how big some of the sprites would be, but after reading your comment, I've realized I'll need to rethink my bookmark. However, I would still like the patterns for the individual sprites, if possible. I may eventually turn my "bookmark" idea into another project. Thanks for your advice/help.

Jim, I made some patterns from those sprites in the SNES version of Super Mario Brothers 3 - it looked to me like most of your pictures were from the SNES version.

I couldn't find Mario in the boot, and you might want to double-check the colors, et. all to make sure they're OK. Hope these help! If there's any others you need, or want the NES version or whatnot, let me know!

Here is the last 2!

THANKS! as soon as i figure out exactly what i want to do, i'll get started and post a pic