Woozy Waggies: Stuffed, Whiskered, and Bowed

And it's done.

My stuffing technique leaves a great deal to be desired. 

Even with newly narrowed seams and overly zealous seam grading, the ears are really hard to stuff. Not only are they tiny and already stuffed with seam allowances, but the stuffing has to travel up the front legs, through the neck, and around the head bend before finally reaching the ears. It's a bit awkward.

The whiskers may be overkill, but they disguise the mumps look I inadvertently gave the poor thing.

The pattern called for the whiskers to be cut out of wool, or alternately, yarn. I didn’t have any black wool yardage, nor could I find any black wool yarn, but I did have some black polar fleece that made a nice substitute.

The nose and eyes were supposed to be embroidered — yeah, right. Two faceted shank buttons give Scotty a blank yet steely-eyed gaze.

I did make a stab at embroidering the nose, the first time I’ve picked up an embroidery needle since I was nine and worked up a day-of-the-week tea towel. (Wednesday, Dutch girl, dreary household chore) While there wasn’t any embroidery floss, there was some black cotton yarn, in case I ever get ambitious enough to whip up this or this or this. I separated a strand, threaded up a huge needle to accommodate the still fairly thick yarn, and discovered that not only did the huge needle make huge holes in the fabric, the holes were so huge that stuffing exited along with the needle. (Have I sighed yet in this post?) Polar fleece to the rescue.

The pattern didn’t call for eyebrows, but I added them to balance out the whiskers. I’m not sure I like them. All that black is too much on a smallish toy. I think it would have worked better with a dark or patterned fabric, where the whiskers and eyebrows would have blended in instead of standing out so starkly. Next time, next time. The plaid bow is quite jaunty, though.

This version was just a trial, made to get a feel for the pattern. If the design gets a thumbs-up from the recipient, I’ll make it again, but only after substantially enlarging the pattern.

And even though it’s just a proto-Scotty, I do wish I’d done a little better job.

Woof.

A Well-Built Loaf

Last week's wingin'-it loaf yielded a great slice: light, moist, and springy, with a nice crunch from the cracked wheat. With only 1/2 cup cracked wheat vs 1-1/2 cups multigrain cereal, it's a little less dense than the original recipe, and has a less complex flavor. Still, it's a good starting point for cereal/wheat/white ratio experiments. Delightfully chewy and with a decent wheatiness, it's easily good enough to stand on its own, too. And, it makes great toast.

To start, combine                1/2 cup cracked wheat 

                                           1-1/2 cups cups boiling water 

Cook about 10 minutes, till most of the water is absorbed. Mine didn't and it was fine. In fact, I was glad, because I wanted that water to be soaked up by a little 8-grain cereal. Also, be warned: the slurry will want to boil over.

When it's done cooking, pour into the bowl of a standing mixer or other large bowl.

Stir in                                  the last of your multigrain cereal (I used about 1/4 cup)

Let stand for 10-15 minutes.

Add                                    1/4 cup butter and stir till it's mostly melted

Cook's calls for 2-1/2 cups water; Beard, 2-1/2 cups (milk/water) + 1/3 cup water in which the yeast is dissolved. I don't much care about that 1/3 cup, so I add

                                            1 cup lukewarm water (actually, about half water and half skim milk, because it's hard for me to finish a carton.)

Before proceeding, check the mixture's temperature - you don't want to kill the yeast. It should be about 100°.


Stir in                                   2 Tbsp honey 
                                            2-1/2 tsp instant yeast 


Then, work in gradually
                                             8 oz whole wheat flour (about 1-1/2 cups)
                                             14 oz white flour (2-1/2 -- 3 cups; I used a mix of high-protein and all-purpose)*

Add about 1 cup of flour at a time or you will have a Big Floury Mess.

(I didn't forget the salt; it's added later)

Knead with the stand mixer (or by hand - it's fun! Try it!) till it forms a pleasing ball. This should take a couple of minutes. Cover with a tea towel and let stand for 20 minutes.

Add                                            2-1/2 tsp salt
                                                  1/4 cup flax seeds 
                                                  1/2 cup rolled oats

Knead in as best you can. My mixer does a terrible job of both incorporating the flour at the bowl's bottom and distributing the oats and seeds, so at this point, I knead by hand for a few minutes. I also like feeling the dough come to life in my hands.

Put back in the bowl, cover, and let rise for 45-90 minutes, till doubled in bulk. (Confession: I put the dough right back into the unwashed, ungreased mixing bowl. With 1/4 cup butter and a quick rise, it's fine. Really.)

When the dough's doubled, punch it down and let rest for 10 minutes. The rest period makes it easier to shape, though frankly, my attitude toward shaping mirrors my attitude toward placing the dough into a pristine, greased bowl. I like my loaves to look nice; I do not require perfection. Divide the dough in half (I may not shape but I do weigh), shape into loaves, cover, and let rise till the dough is peeping over the rim. At this point, I wet one hand, give each loaf top a good rubdown, and sprinkle well with quick oats. (I find that quick oats adhere better than regular rolled oats)

Bake at 375 degrees for 35-40 minutes, until the bread registers 200 degrees.

Tip out of the pans and let cool.

I slice and freeze what I don't eat immediately, then pull out slices as needed.

*The measurement for white flour is approximate and will depend on whether you use a mix of bread/all-purpose or either one singly. You'll probably need more than 14 oz flour if you're using only all-purpose, and less than 14 oz if you opt for bread flour. Weather conditions, accuracy of measuring utensils, and other factors will have a bearing on how much flour is needed.

Experiment! Don't be afraid! It's bread, and forgiving. It wants to be baked.

Woozy Waggies: A Confusion of Limbs

“Now join front legs to body at G…”

Front legs, front legs, front legs. Where the hell are the front legs? Pick through remaining pieces. Check floor. Check under machine. Check under sofa (cat). Check original pattern. Note that piece “chin” is also piece “front legs.” Sigh.

This flat strip wraps around the dog’s face and chin, then continues down the neck and chest to form the front legs. The strip must turn two sharp corners, the chin and the neck.

Corners are easier to sew if the piece being turned is face up, so that the folds and excess fabric can be kept away from the needle. For added fun  —  the kind of fun only a Woozy Waggie can offer  —  one corner is face up and the other face down. I try to wing it and fail.

On the other side, I get smart and flip the fabric after sewing the first corner. I hate breaking up a seam, but I hate ripping out stitches even more.

Forming the two rear feet is a royal pain. The pieces are tiny, not much bigger than a large postage stamp, and the four sides are joined to four different body parts: the body, the rear legs, the underbelly, and finally, the crotch. On each foot, that’s four corners to turn, all in a very small space. There are seam allowances to deal with too, and I don’t know what to do with them. I still don’t know what to do with them.

Sewing the feet was a breeze compared to sewing the crotch. The even tinier, bias-cut crotch piece is supposed to “s-t-r-e-t-c-h” and form a V with the legs and belly. It stretches, all right. It also frays. And as to forming that V — sorry, no, not going to happen. In ripping out my shoddy first attempt, I discover that I’ve forgotten to reset the stitch length after staystitching with miniscule stitches. Resist temptation to throw something. Eventually, a wide U is formed and I call it good.

The misshapen, lumpy paws are good, too. It’s all good. Good, good, good.

The front paws are a snap and Scotty’s ready to stuff. The generous opening:

My aunt Fanny we’ll stuff that.

Well, maybe tomorrow.

Next: Buttons and bows (and stuffing)

Woozy Waggies: Under the Needle

Or, Frustration: 1, E: 0.

Sewing the tail together was an inauspicious start. Of course, I could have read the instructions first, but I keep confusing this pattern with another Scotty dog pattern that was sent at the same time. That pattern's instructions, such as they are, are printed hither and yon amidst the pattern pieces. The Woozy Waggies pattern has what passes as actual directions, contained in one location, though they’re rarely more explicit than “join E of body to E of face.”

Getting back to step 1. After correctly sewing and joining the tail to the Eiffel Tower-like back legs, the legs are sewn to the body.

It is at this point I realize I’ve cut two identical body pieces, rather than flipping the pattern piece to create mirror images. Luckily, there is a lot of fabric. With that minor annoyance taken care of, the back strip is joined to the body. The two pieces need to be stretched and clipped for a smooth fit. An experienced seamstress would know this; a beginner, relying on the pattern for instructions, would be SoL. (The seam was clipped after the photo was taken)

Now the real fun begins. The narrow face strip is about an inch longer than the body to which it is sewn.

Did I somehow miscut? Are my notches way off? Lining up the cloth pieces against the original pattern shows that everything is cut and marked correctly. The body is cut on the straight grain and can’t possibly stretch so much as to fit the face piece. As I stew over this, desperately wishing I had some beer, I read the instructions again. “Next join E of body to E of face. Whiskers may be inserted” blah blah blah “Next, join notches F of face and back, forming the ears.” No clue about the mystery inch in the directions. Stew, ponder, sigh, fret. Finally it dawns on me that the face strip wraps around the body to form the nose.

It seems obvious now, but it wasn’t at the time, and there are no procedural sketches or diagrams.

Using very short stitches, I staystitch both edges of the face strip in the nose area, just shy of the seam line, so that I can clip the turn without worrying about clipping too deep.

Pin, stitch, disaster. Because the pieces are so small, and because of the curves and stretching involved, pins aren’t enough to keep the fabric edges aligned, unless you want to use about 16 pins per inch. Hand basting is the only way to go. (Here, the small pieces are a blessing.) The pieces go together quickly, and if my blast-through-this-damn-piece pace obliterates Scotty’s brow bone — well, so be it.

As I join notches F to form the ears, or ears, I can’t help but notice that said ears are really quite tiny, quite tiny indeed.

Tiny enough that I know there’s no way in God’s green earth I’m going to be able to turn them inside-out. Rip stitches, sew a really narrow seam, trim as close as humanly possible, finger press, turn, and voila! Poke through tips and side seam with the trusty bamboo pointy thing. View lumpy, frayed ears with displeasure. Grit teeth.

At this point it’s obvious that the fabric I’ve chosen is a little too heavy to capture Scotty’s every winning detail. The fabric is a lightweight denim, far thinner than the velveteen or corduroy I’d envisioned for the final version. Still, I’ll forge ahead. This first go-round won’t be anything to write home about, but it’ll allow me to work out all the pattern quirks and puzzlements before committing to better fabric. And if I enlarge the pattern by 30% or so, it’ll give me a lot more room to work with. We want those ears turned on a dime, damn it!

Next: The Underbelly

Baking whilst baking

I don’t bake as much bread in the summer as I do in winter, especially on 98° days. But, bread was needed so bread occurred.

Cook’s Illustrated’s Multigrain Sandwich Loaf is, with a few minor changes, my standby. There’s always a sliced loaf in the freezer hobnobbing with what other breadstuffs have suited my fancy of late. Apparently, not much has suited my fancy of late because the freezer is a pretty lonely place as far as bread goes. The last stragglers were consumed this morning and so yes, bread was needed.

The recipe calls for 1-1/4 cups of 7-grain cereal mix. I’ve used a variety of multigrain cereals from Bob’s Red Mill and all have been great, with the 8-grain being particularly good. Alas, there’s only about 1/4 cup left in the fridge and damn it, the bee in my bonnet is buzzing for bread now. A container of cracked wheat reminds me of a James Beard recipe and I decide to wing it and merge the recipes.

In the Cook’s recipe, boiling water is simply poured over the cereal. (This doesn’t work with cracked wheat, trust me.) Beard’s recipe cooks 1/2 cup wheat in 1-1/2 cups boiling water for 10 minutes. He does not however, warn against fiddling around in the basement for a few while the wheat cooks.

Did you know that even at a simmer, cracked wheat boils over? And over, and over, and over.

Sweet mother of mercy does this stuff smell bad. Ugh.

But the bread goes together beautifully and in no time at all is nestling under a tea towel.

I forget how much more quickly bread rises in a kitchen that's 82 instead of 62. Before I have time to really goof off, it's time to shape and let rise for a second time.

Happy little loaves in the fading light

Tomorrow’s breakfast.

No, not both loaves. Geeze.

Did I mention the cookies? Before there was bread, there were cookies.

Peanut butter cookies. Peanut butter cookies with lots of peanut butter. And ground peanuts. And peanut butter chips. 

They're a shade too brown, but the timer went off just as the boiling honey spilled over my hand. It's easier to bake more cookies than regenerate flesh.

Uh, bon appétit?

August blooms

Despite the beautiful late summer blooms, Comtesse de Barbantane doesn't do much for me. Maybe I just can't get over the damp, doughy, balled-up brown "flowers" that cover the plant in spring. It doesn't have much fragrance in my yard and it's not assorting well with its bedmates. A move to the east bed may be in order.

The old Hybrid Teas don't garner much attention, and it's a shame.

This pink beauty is Mrs. Charles Bell, a member of the delightful Radiance clan. It's a large (5 ft), vigorous bush that doesn't mind a bit being hacked back, blithely sending up shoots and canes no matter what the weather. Always in bloom, always trouble-free, and deliciously fragrant.

Think hostas are just a boring clump of leaves, grown only by those doomed to garden in shade? Ha! Not only does the huge Hosta Plantaginea thrive in sunlight here in Stumptown, it's also incredibly fragrant -- rich, sweet, and heady.

Sitting outside on an August evening, with the fragrance of the roses, hostas, and basil mixing in with that of your gin and tonic -- well, it's almost like being alive.

Woozy Waggies: Big pieces into little pieces

At the mill, “make big pieces into little pieces” was the standard response to anyone who asked what we did. Thankfully, these big pieces are a lot easier to handle than slabs of Sitka spruce.

I'll start by transferring the Scotty's pattern pieces onto pattern tracing cloth.

Tracing cloth is great stuff -- it’s like a lightweight interfacing, sheer enough to see through yet far sturdier than tissue. Even though this reproduction pattern is printed on actual paper, I’m using the tracing cloth to preserve the pattern and because pinning and cutting through paper is a pain.

With that done, it's time to hunt through my fabric stash. Since this is just a test run, a muslin Scotty if you will, I shouldn't much care what the fabric is. But of course, I do. After rejecting patterns (no gingham dogs this time), denims (too denim-y), twill (why the hell do I have Lurex stretch twill?), some brown stuff (brown), and about 3,000 pounds of other pieces, I finally settle on a lightweight red denim. It's a nice big piece, 2 1/2 yards of 60" fabric. (What was I thinking? I don't even wear red!) The pattern calls for 1/3 yard of fabric, so I rip a generous foot, iron (I prewash fabric as soon as it comes home), and am ready to go.

Six of the 10 pieces are cut on the bias. Bleh. As I ponder how best to do this, my eyes fall on my big grid ruler, that -- Yes! -- has 45 degree markings. Sigh of relief. By placing a grid line parallel to the selvedge, laying the pieces on the bias is a piece of cake.

Chalk lines drawn parallel to the selvedge serve as a reference point for the next pieces.

Just a couple pins to hold each piece in place until I'm sure the layout is correct, then voila!

Done!

Next: Under the needle