A finish - Darth Vader mini glow in the dark quilt!

Last week was a mental busy week, but Lord Vader, not known for his patience at the best of times insisted on being finished on time for the #maythe4thbewith you swap on instagram! 

He is now winging his way across the Atlantic as part of #MQSteamSith.  I picked the light side and was paired up with the dark so I chose Vader - he really is the best baddy - sorry Kylo Ren is not a patch on the grand daddy!

This was a real experiment in terms of technique and materials and I'm happy to report my adventures with glow in the dark fabric & thread and Lara's Crafted Applique method worked out a treat.

I received my copy of Lara's book last week and will be taking part of the blog hop next Month when I'll have a copy to giveaway to a lucky reader.  I couldn't resist diving in straight away and using this new method for Vader.

I don't normally pre-wash fabrics but Lara recommended it for the type of glue I was using for my applique work. so Vader was treated to Lotus Flower, Lily scented!  Persil small & mighty might have been a bit more apt but I was determined to put some light side of the force in there somewhere, and while he is scowling down at my swap partner, at least he'll smell nice!

Pre-treated fabric dried in no time!

The most fun I had was making the templates.  He's modelled after Lego Star Wars and for some reason I gave him batteries in his hands.  No clue why.  G did ask me why I made him look so angry - but well he's Vader!  Not exactly known for his smiles!

Using Lara's method I was able to get very thin cuts in his body armour for the detailing and glow in the dark to shine through, with out worrying about fraying - this made everything so much easier!

Quilting him was a bit of a pain with the glow in the dark thread.  It's a 40 weight and not a huge amount on the spool.  Straight stitching close to the edge worked out really well but the free motion had the top thread shredding a lot and lots of breakage.  I figured the layers, including the glow in the dark fabric, which is a poly something or other and quite thick, might not be helping so I switched to a Jeans needle and plain sailing from there - makes me think I might try a bigger needle for regular free motion too to see if that helps at all.

Finding glow in the dark fabric was a bit of a hunt online.  First lot didn't glow, second glowed nicely but with a pattern in it that really didn't suit Vader and the third try was clothing fabric from Romania, bought on eBay - worked out OK in the end!

Bound him in dark grey and wrote on the back instead of a label, as he glows front and back and I didn't want to break the silhouette the stitched applique created.   A really fun project in the end!

Last week was the week we had Wilbur up at the Veterinary College in Dublin for tests.  Thanks to everyone who enquired about him!  We had to get him there last Monday for 9.30 which meant an early start.  Wilbur is not a good traveller in the car and made his displeasure known vocally for the whole trip up!

Still he was a very good patient and put up with the blood tests, MRI, and shaving of various parts of him!

Charly didn't miss him one bit!  She loved being the only dog in the village and with the weather being so good had tons of fun chasing the blackbirds, starlings and her ball in the garden for hours and hours!

We collected him last Thursday and the news is no sign of infection, parasite or most importantly tumours that could cause seizures.  With his age they strongly suspected cancer but thankfully all clear and it's lifelong meds for Wilbs to control the epilepsy.  We are very relieved at the result!

On the way home we stopped off in Kilkenny for me to give a talk on Modern Quilting to the South Midlands branch of the Irish Patchwork Society.  Wilbur smelled the sights of Kilkenny with G for an hour and a half while I talked about quilting.  Some members got to make a fuss of him in the car park afterwards - after all how could you not love this face?

Did the long walk keep him quiet for the journey home - not a chance!  Still all back to normal now thank God!