Attee’s Story – The journey from there to here!

I started out in a field somewhere, on the back of a goat. Eventually, I became a non-descript hunk of mohair that went to a factory. There, the folks took over, but they did something different to me. Or maybe I should say they didn’t do anything to me. They didn’t process me or anything, just wove me into something called string mohair. I’m pretty tall, about an inch long, but pretty sparse (that means I don’t have too many other hairs crowding me out.)

My bearmaker, Helena, found me at a teddy bear maker supplier’s booth at a teddy bear show last summer and fell in love with me. She didn’t know what she was going to do with me, but she heard there are all sorts of neat things you can do with my type of fur. But I just sat there, and sat there and nothing happened.

I was shown to someone and right away I was chosen to become a very special bear……….a bear with attitude! And so, my real journey began. I’m in for the journey of a lifetime and I want you to join me. I’ve even got a few pictures to show you. This is my diary. How exciting to be able to share it with you.

Panic set in. Helena knew what bear pattern she wanted to use, but she couldn’t find it anywhere. Oh, she found the body, but couldn’t find the parts for my head. Now wouldn’t that be something – a headless bear! Hard to show attitude without having a face, huh?

After searching nearly every tiny square inch of her tiny new home, Helena found all the pieces that she’ll need to make my head and ears. First she put me down on a table and gently traced out all the pattern pieces. And then she cut “me” out. I’m already starting to feel my personality come to life. Cutting is so time consuming. My patience really helped as she used tiny, tiny cuts to make sure that she only cut the backing of the fur and not the fur itself. If she weren’t so careful, I’d look like a choppy bear, with attitude.

After a while, Helena took all of me and stuck me in a plastic basin full of really dark turquoise colored water. Round and round we go as she stirred me for half an hour non-stop. I was having a lot of fun, but felt so sorry for Helena. She was bored to tears and to top it all off, she ended up with green hands!

After being rinsed of a gazoodle of times, I was hung up to dry. Before I was dyed, Helena thought ahead and strung me with fishing line so I could gently hang over the kitchen sink. I dried up pretty scraggly, just the way I wanted to be!

Next came the preliminary stitching. Helena stuck needles all over me to hold my different parts together so she could start a set of locked blanket stitches to hold me together so she could take the pins out. I’m a special bear and I’m going to be completely sewn by hand. When she pinned me, she made sure my fur was neatly tucked in. After she sews me “for real”, she’ll make sure that all the fur that should be outside stays outside the seam and the fur that should stay inside is pulled back into the seam. She calls this “grooming” the seams.

Bit by bit, I’m coming together. My ears are done. My legs are stitched, but I still need to have my paw pads put in. One arm is done. You can maybe see in the picture that Helena has “clipped” all of the curved seams. This makes sure that when I get turned right side out, that the seams look good. (Remember Sewing 101 in Home Ec.?)

It looks really strange to see my paw curved so much. Helena was telling someone that the inside pattern piece is deliberately made shorter than the outside one so that it will curve in – just like you were holding out your arms for a hug. Even though I’ve got quite an attitude, I still need hugs. I need to have them and I need to give them.

Helena’s taking a bit of a break because her hands are getting sore, but please come back again and find out more of my adventures!