Star Wars Rebels Loth-cat Plush

The first season of Star Wars Rebels came to an end on Monday night. I wasn't ready for the season to be over, but after watching the incredible events that unfolded in "Fire Across the Galaxy" (read my review at Nerdist), I'm really not ready to wait and wait. Of course, as long as I can get in the room to see the season two premiere at Celebration Anaheim, I won't have to wait too long.

Anyway, as I thought about the Rebels season finale last Sunday I decided I wanted to make something to commemorate the occasion. I thought about characters and symbols I love in the series and considered the supplies I had on hand and the answer was obvious: a Loth-cat plush! Loth-cats have shown up on Lothal a handful of times in the series, and they've sort of played a role in Ezra's Jedi training. And? They're rather adorable even when they're being vicious.

Image via StarWars.com

Gif via Tumblr

The Loth-cat is part of the tooka family. We saw actual tookas - felines like Loth-cats but with more purple-ish markings - in Coruscant at the end of season five of Star Wars: The Clone Wars. But long before that, we saw a plush tooka doll. A little Twi'lek named Numa had a tooka doll in the first season episode of The Clone Wars called  "Innocents of Ryloth." It became part of the story as Waxer found the doll after Numa lost it and gave it back to her. Awww.

Bonnie Burton made a version of the tooka doll and included it in The Star Wars Craft Book. Since tookas and loth-cats are from the same family of creatures, I decided to take the pattern and use different colors of felt to make a Loth-cat plush!

I added some extra felt to give my plush a tummy and added some patches, stripes, and a tail.

I am really, really slow at sewing by hand (plus I screwed up once or twice) so making this little guy took most of Sunday evening. I stayed up until waaay past my bedtime to finish him because I knew if I didn't get it done before Monday that it would have to be set aside for days and I needed a Loth-cat to cuddle during the season finale. And cuddle him I did. I also maybe cried on him a little.

I have a couple more Star Wars Rebels craft projects on my list for this weekend (I only have two more weekends at home before Celebration, yikes!). I'm making a Hera t-shirt and maybe a Chopper wearable of some kind using this template I made for a trick-or-treat bag.