I've developed the direction of hair growth and have worked out the position of the whiskers. I used a 6H pencil to lay down a number of layers of graphite using light strokes in the direction of growth then continued with H, B and 2B pencils to create the shading variations. For the whiskers I began by drawing in the shadow under each one and then tried to maintain the whiteness above it as the whisker itself...gradually refining the thickness and lifting out smudging and such with a kneaded eraser. I do not use any blending tools other than an 8H pencil with a very light touch. This seems for me to pull enough graphite out and to create a crisp yet blended transition. The key for me is to keep laying down graphite gradually. I made this progress over 4 hours last evening.