Once Dolly got her head out of my Tupperware I got going with a bit of sharpening, a bit of chopping and a bit of carving...
We are having some wonderful weather here in Devon.
The Blackbirds have been pairing up and we have a few couples building nests close to the house. The boys are in a fighting mood, but they seem to rub along .
I've been busy with my new axe making kuksa and spoons.
And the Black birds have given me some inspiration.
I was asked by my friend Mark Lane if I could take a group of his students from Embercombe and teach them the rudiments of spoon carving.
These students are all volunteers and have very little in the way of money, but lots in the way of enthusiasm and determination. They duly arrived bearing things with which they could trade for a day with me and Dolly;
locally made cider, wine and lots of vegetables from their allotments up at Embercombe.
We started the day with some axing techniques. I would recommend to anyone who is just starting with axe work to go buy some 6 inch nails and practice, with a hammer, gently knocking them in. This will help, to a certain degree, with your accuracy.
Once our blanks were chopped we moved on to some knife techniques.
Luckily I have a few MaChris knives that I could share with my students.
Lunchtime bought a wonderful Chick pea curry made by the students, we moved indoors as it began to rain a little.
Earlier in the day we had to borrow Dolly's personal stump. She was not a happy chicken, when we finished with the axes we put her stump back in the studio...Where it belongs....J;-)
They all did very well learning new skills, I'm sure we will see there spoons on show in the future.
We all had a great time carving and chatting. I will visit Embercombe soon and give the students some sharpening tuition. Looking forward to another curry...
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Originally Posted by Terry
