Introducing Gabriel Oak

Gabriel Oak is a character from Thomas Hardy’s 1874 novel, ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’. In Hardy’s story, Gabriel plays the part of a handsome young shepherd who suffers unrequited love for a beautiful but haughty and rather shallow woman, Bathsheba Everdene. Bathsheba prefers the dashing Captain Troy. She marries Troy, but after many trials and tribulations, Troy is killed by another of Bathsheba's suitors and she is free to marry her true love, Gabriel, in one of the very few happy endings that Hardy allows.

My Gabriel Oak is a mini-scarecrow dressed in the baby clothes that I found the other day in friend Rozi’s stash (see my previous entry on Freaky Faces). Here’s how I made him.

I selected a pair of strong utility trousers, a jolly check shirt, a pair of trainers, a hat and some sleep mittens from Rozi’s treasure trove. Rozi brilliantly suggested that I also take home an all-in-one sleepsuit to hold all the scarecrow’s stuffing firmly in place. This worked a treat!

For Gabriel’s head, I enlarged a cloth doll’s head pattern by 350%. The head has a neck gusset as well as a back and a face, which makes it really three-dimensional. I cut out the pattern pieces from flesh-coloured fabric, paying careful attention to the grain of the fabric so that the head would not distort when it was stuffed. I machine-sewed the pieces together, leaving a gap at the top of the head through which to insert the stuffing. This hole will be hidden under Gabriel’s hat.

Before stuffing the head with doll stuffing, I inserted one ball of a dumb-bell shaped wooden armature into the middle of Gabriel’s head, so that the bar of the bell and the other ball protruded down from his neck. This device would serve to attach his head securely to his body.

I stuffed Gabriel’s head firmly with polyester doll stuffing and drew his features onto his face with crayons. To complete his head, I stitched blond doll hair all around the brim of the hat, and clamped it tightly onto Gabriel’s head. The doll’s head pattern worked surprisingly well, especially considering how much I had needed to enlarge it.

I began to stuff the body by filling the feet of the sleepsuit with doll stuffing, before putting Gabriel’s shoes on. They stayed on without my needing to do anything more to secure them. Then I stuffed the legs of the suit with doll stuffing.

I used a length of my favourite foam pipe insulation to make Gabriel’s arms, cutting them at the ‘elbows’ and inserting a wooden ball at each elbow to form a flexible joint. I stuffed the mittens and sewed them onto both ends of the pipe to suggest hands. I pushed the length of articulated pipe down inside the arms of the sleepsuit so that the mittens popped out of the cuffs. I sewed the cuffs of the suit to the mittens to keep everything in place and filled out the upper arms with extra doll stuffing.

To attach the head firmly to the body, I wrapped the bar of the dumb-bell that was sticking out of Gabriel’s neck firmly to the centre of his pipe insulation arms with duct tape. I wrapped some quilt wadding around the other ball, and tucked it inside the body of the sleepsuit so that it lay flat in the middle of Gabriel’s chest.  

I stuffed out the torso of the Gabriel’s sleepsuit with more doll stuffing and buttoned up the poppers down his front to hold all the stuffing together inside his body. To ensure a snug fit at the neck and prevent the stuffing from coming out, I ran a drawstring around the neck of the sleepsuit and pulled it tightly against the wooden armature.

Finally, it was time to ‘dress’ Gabriel in his clothes; first the shirt and then the trousers. Like the shoes, Gabriel’s clothes do not need to be sewn in place as they fit snugly to his figure. I added a red cloth kerchief round his neck. As Gabriel is a shepherd, I tucked a black knitted sheep that I had made earlier under one arm and I gave him a bunch of carrots, run up from odds and ends of material, to hold in his other hand.

Gabriel is a solid, weighty, soft-bodied scarecrow. He is poseable, and he can either sit down or stand if propped against a solid support. If I need him to stand independently, I can support him from a wooden dowel attached to the centre back belt loop of his trousers. 

Politically Incorrect Scarecrow?

On Saturday, David and I drove to an industrial estate in Bletchely to collect his car, which had just passed its annual MOT. As we drove into the estate, my eye was caught by a scarecrow, made entirely out of drainage and plumbing components, standing in one of the neighbouring units’ yards. As David took a photo on his mobile phone, he was approached by a worried-looking man who asked, “Can I help you?”. Apparently the scarecrow has attracted some complaints that it is unacceptable, because it looks like a Golliwog. This is probably due to the fact that the scarecrow’s face has been made out of a round drain cover, a component that only comes in black. I’m sure that no racist insult was intended, but the story illustrates just how much first impressions matter when it comes to scarecrows. 

Problems with Necks

After two days of torrential rain, Farmer George was soaked through to his plastic bag skin. George’s head became so heavy with rainwater that the 'wonderful' pipe insulation foam I had used for his armature could not support the weight of his head any more. When the sun came out again, poor George was looking very shy and sad.

Intrepid husband David got out his ladder and braved the blackthorn to make some repairs to George. The ‘ear lugs’ I had formed from the raw ends of his sacking head (see my blog for Monday, 8 April 2013, Introducing Farmer George) came in useful to loop some twine through, in order to tie George’s head firmly back to the trunk of his tree. Once more, George is boldly gazing out down the Bradwell Road to announce the All Saints’ scarecrow trail to passers by.

Whilst we were fixing George up, a villager who happened to be passing by, remarked; “He’s so lifelike that when I first walked past the other day, I thought someone was breaking into your shed!”

Whilst we were at it, I strengthened the neck of my flowerpot scarecrow (see my blog for Thursday, 11 April 2013, The Simplest Scarecrow Ever) by drilling right through both the end of the garden cane protector and the centre of the plastic flowerpot, in order to push the body’s armature through into the Oasis foam that had been placed inside the pot to anchor the flower decorations. This made the junction between flowerpot and armature much more secure.

Now that I’ve built a couple of scarecrows, I am beginning to appreciate that the way in which the scarecrow’s head is joined onto and supported by the armature at the neck is a potential weak point in any scarecrow design. As I tackle my mini-scarecrow today, I’ll be addressing this by modifying the way in which I attach his head to his body.

Freaky faces

Yesterday afternoon, I went round to my friend Rozi’s house to ‘borrow’ some of her toddler son’s Baby clothes to make a mini-scarecrow. Clothing for babies has become more fashion conscious in recent years, and new mothers can dress even a newborn baby boy in cute, stylish outfits that closely replicate those of their adult partner. I’m surprised that there are not more scarecrow builds on the Internet that use baby clothes as a basis for making a mini-scarecrow. Maybe this is why?

Here’s the experience of a talented lady called Dawn Isaac, who writes a delightful and informative blog aimed a getting children involved in gardening. It is called ‘Little Green Fingers’, http://littlegreenfingers.typepad.com/little_green_fingers/ In 2009, Dawn had the same idea as I have just had, of building a mini-scarecrow using her children’s cast off baby clothes. Writing of her first attempt, Dawn reports that she had been aiming at ‘cute’ but instead, “I think we've ended up with something that will actually frighten off almost anything.”

The following year, Dawn blogged, “Last year the children and I made a mini-scarecrow which was, quite frankly, one of the ugliest and most disturbing garden ornaments I have ever seen.” She went on to describe it as a ‘malevolent presence’ in the veg patch. Dawn tried again in 2010, but her children’s reaction was no better than the previous year, "That's freaky - it's got no face."

The faces of people we encounter everyday form the visual backdrop to our lives. How we recognise our friends and distinguish them from strangers is one of those things that we tend not to think about, but throughout the course of every single day we rely on our brain's ongoing skill at facial recognition to help us interact socially. Scientists believe that humans process faces differently from other objects. Apparently, our ability to recognise faces is so important to us that the brain has an area called the fusiform gyrus, which is completely dedicated to this one task. However, face recognition is a very complex process, as the recognition of different human emotions like happiness, anger or grief, involves extensive and diverse areas in the brain. Nowadays, our  physical survival rarely depends on our ability to 'read' the information 'written' in people's faces, but correctly interpreting human expressions remains an essential social competence that helps us to communicate and empathise with one another. 

Most of the time, scarecrow-builders do not need to bother too much about whether or not their creation’s face appears freaky, but using baby clothes to dress a mini-scarecrow may mean that greater attention than usual needs to be paid to the character and expression revealed in the scarecrow’s face. Even before I saw Dawn’s blog, I had decided to try scaling up one of my doll making patterns to make a more realistic three-dimensional, needle-sculpted face for my mini-scarecrow. What initially seemed like a short cut to building an attractive and easy scarecrow is now beginning to look like a considerable challenge. Follow this space to see how I get on!

The Simplest Scarecrow Ever

This project can take anything from half an hour, if all the preparation is done in advance, to a couple of hours, if you hand colour the papers and paint the flowerpot. The resulting scarecrow is as tall as a child, so it would make a lovely project do make in class, especially if accompanied by a storytelling session.

Clean a plastic flowerpot and (if you like, as this is not absolutely necessary, especially if the pot is terracotta coloured) paint it with flesh coloured waterproof acrylic paint. Before beginning to paint the flowerpot, I glued a nose, made from a plastic bottle cap, onto the side of the pot. It may take two coats of paint to fully cover the flowerpot. Set aside to dry.

I glued a plastic garden cane protector to the centre of the base of the pot, that I will push the scarecrow’s cane armature into, later on in the assembly process. As an alternative, drill a hole in the centre of the flowerpot, large enough to push a garden cane through.

When the paint is dry, with the pot standing on its base and the open end at the top, draw, paint or stick a smiley face on the outside of the flowerpot. I used goggle eyes, for a surprised expression, and pieces of fun foam and felt for the cheeks, lips and eyebrows.

Gather together some pieces of coloured paper in colours that will represent flowers, grass and leaves. I painted my own papers, but commercial ones will do just as well. Children love sloshing paint on paper, but this will make for a more messy activity. The papers need to be coloured on both sides so if you do paint your own papers, you need to allow lots of extra time for the papers to dry.

Cut a raggedy edge strip of green paper a little longer than the circumference of the flowerpot to represent grass. Stick it to the inside of the flowerpot with double sided Sellotape. The grass represents the scarecrow’s hair. You may want to introduce a few ‘curls’ by bending some of the grass stalks with your fingers. If you like, you can add some extra rows of grass/hair down the back of the pot to cover the back of the scarecrow’s head.

Push a circle of Oasis floral foam down inside the flowerpot until it is wedged firmly in place. This is to stick flowers into, to decorate the scarecrow’s head.

Cut plenty of flower and leaf shapes from the remaining coloured papers. I used a set of dies to make mine, but freehand cutting will be equally nice. Paint some sticks green to represent the flower stalks. Alternatively, straws or pipe cleaners will work just as well.

Layer two or three flower shapes together to make a composite flower, securing the layers to one another with glue or glue dots. Insert the stick/stalk between the back and the middle or top layer. Add a leaf (or two) to the stalk, securing it round the stalk with glue. Push each flower down into the Oasis as you finish it, until the Oasis is full of flowers. That completes the head.

 Alternatively, you could use artificial flowers to decorate the head. You could even put a present or some sweets (provided they are not too heavy) into the flowerpot, as a nice surprise for the recipient.

Make a simple cross-shaped armature from two garden canes. I used plastic canes but bamboo is just as good. Lash the canes together firmly with garden twine. I also packed out the very tip of my cane with some double-sided Sellotape, so that the scarecrow’s head would fit tightly.

Dress the scarecrow with a simple length of cloth, folded in two, with a tiny hole cut at the centre for the neck to pass through. I used a hessian sack for a rustic look. Add a bandana in a contrasting colour. Push the completed head onto the top of the neck end of the vertical cane. Voila!

It’s not just about scarecrows!

Yesterday, I posted off the last batch of over seventy letters, written to every business in our civil parish asking them to support Loughton’s Scarecrow Trail. Researching those enterprises has proved a fascinating and absorbing task. I had no idea that so many international companies are based in Loughton, and I had previously been oblivious to the diverse occupations, talents and skills of our local business community. Participating in the trail, either by building and entering a scarecrow in the competition for local firms and organizations, or by donating a raffle prize or sponsoring scarecrow-building in one of our local schools, would be an unusual and engaging way for the business community to reach out to local people and open the eyes of Loughton’s residents to the area’s hidden potential for enterprise and creativity.

Having sown the seeds of sponsorship by sending out my ‘begging letters’, I’m now beginning to nurture them with a follow up phone call, personally inviting each of the organizations to participate. This can result in some surprises, epitomizing the ‘highs and lows’ that must be familiar to anyone seeking sponsorship for community projects. “I don’t think there’s any point in inviting the local medical practice to take part,” prophesied husband David. “They are bound to be too busy, and will be sure to think a scarecrow trail is frivolous.” I was therefore delighted to receive an email announcing that they were intending to enter not one scarecrow, but two! I’m pleased to report that several local businesses, both large and small, have already enthusiastically embraced Loughton’s scarecrow trail project.

However, attracting donations is proving a little trickier. In addition to recurrent expenditure of £1000 a week, All Saints’ Church is facing a one-off bill of £8,000 this year for minor, but essential, repairs to the church building, which makes it all the more important that, as well as being an enjoyable community-building event, the Scarecrow Trail proves to be a financial success. I’m sure that the tough financial climate is deterring many enterprises from engaging in philanthropy, but trying to raise money for worthwhile community projects can sometimes prove demoralizing and depressing. “I don’t see much evidence of David Cameron’s ‘big society’ around here”, I grumbled to David over breakfast. This off the cuff remark led to a stimulating discussion about charitable giving.

It also led me to revisit the current Coalition Government’s definition as to what they actually mean by the ‘big society’. It seems that the idea is based on five key principles; open government, promoting localism, devolving power from central to local government, supporting social enterprises and, last but not least, volunteering. It is one way to frame the perpetual struggle between selfishness and compassion that is so characteristic of all human society. Writ large, it is about articulating political principles; writ small, it can indicate the direction of an individual’s moral compass.

The ‘big society’ has attracted a great deal of criticism that it is a ‘fig leaf’ to cover the dismantling of the welfare state and swingeing cuts in government services. Some commentators portray emerging social enterprises as being in competition with the work of more traditional charities; likewise volunteers are sometimes seen as taking jobs away from low paid workers. Fighting poverty and need with altruism and personal generosity certainly feels socially more risky, precarious and provisional than asserting public responsibility for those who are unable to achieve the conditions that are necessary for a minimal standard of living, and the gap between government rhetoric and everyday life sometimes seems almost impossible to bridge. Which makes it all the more striking when David produced this conversation-stopper, “Of course, you do realize that, by stepping up to organize the Scarecrow Trail, you are setting an example of the ‘big society’!”

Scarecrow Inspiration

A few days ago my friend Angela dropped round a mini scarecrow-on-a-stick that she had bought at a local Charity Shop, with Loughton’s Scarecrow Trail in mind. Perhaps, Angela suggested, he could be a useful visual aid? He is indeed a sweet little chap, and he should not prove too challenging for even a novice crafter to make. Over the next day or two, I shall devise a pattern based on him. Maybe I will offer a scarecrow-making kit for sale to make up at home, or a workshop based on him that will appeal to embroiderers, seamstresses and textile artists? Will there be any takers, I wonder? Thank you Angela for thinking of me, and bringing me an inspirational, scarecrow-themed present.