(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
10-23-10 Saturday
90 degrees, good breeze, fast moving small puffs, some were thick. mostly sunny. This weather report is brought to you by the Fort Lauderdale department of Tourism.
During the week, I dug out all my cat ornaments and my paint and painted faces on them. The two cats, the first I made, that were painted red, I painted them brown. I need to paint them with a lighter brown, at least on the front. the rest just had their faces painted and a big white spot on their chest. I found I like the older cats as much as I like the new ones.
THURSDAY:
I had my two bowls and my cat ornaments with me at work since I was going to the turning club meeting. One of the guys had lost a cat recently and one of my newest cats had a resemblance to the cat he lost. He has that one now.
At the turning club meeting, they liked my results on my cats. I asked about the design of my bowls, both of which stated out as something else, and I have just a little bit of design change for next time. One had a slight change in the radius half way down and it should be continuous. the rim needed just a slight adjustment. On the second, just the rim needed a slight correction. Good to know that I had the basic design right.
The demonstration was having four lathes showing how to make things to hang on the tree. One demonstrated how to properly hollow small ornaments. Another made finials to fit into sea urchin ornaments. A fourth showed how to make bracelets which would also be good ring ornaments, and the fourth showed how to make balls that are hollow inside. He also had ornaments where you turn a cove in the middle, then turn it inside out as four glued up pieces and turn down the ends. It becomes like a cage.
I spent most of my time at the sea urchin station and learned a lot, but should have studied more at the others. It is hard. To much is going on at once.
A creation by the 18 year old daughter of one of our members
I had to show this, it is so fantastic.
My litter of kittens I will repaint the two dark ones on the left.
SATURDAY:
I had a dozen projects I wanted to work on today, but a family gathering took place. We went out for breakfast at a time I normally am showing up in the back to do wood working. Since I was riding with Mom, we stopped several places on the way home. It was noon by the time we got back. We viewed each other's pictures and that killed any possible working time I had left.
I tended the backyard beast and Scarface early morning. The beast tends to be 'don't touch me' when he first starts eating, then wants attention after he gets some food. He does want you there, nearby, though, and will follow you until you come back to watch him eat. I solve this by giving scarface a lot of attention until he showed me he had enough. The beast then was about ready for some.
When we got back, I went out and gave the beast some more food and a lot of attention.
Before I left, I went out and all the beast really wanted was attention, and would have loved if I just stayed there for several hours.
I had hoped to start a couple projects today, possibly finishing one tomorrow. Because I did not get a chance to work, I doubt I will finish anything tomorrow.
I have a special crochet hook I want to make. I have a piece of wood that is begging to become a platter. I have a piece of Norfolk that is begging to be another face vase. I have a bunch of sticks for making more flowers. I have cat blanks, swan blanks, more crochet hooks, That is just the list of the most important projects. I have several dozen more to work on.
I will see what happens tomorrow.
year 10, Week 41, Day two (week 563)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
10-24-10 Sunday
85 degrees, mostly fast moving clouds, some blue skies in the afternoon. Showers of liquid sunshine hit several times in the morning, three times I had to pull the lathe inside and wait it out, which the longest one was about half an hour before there was no question that nothing else was coming down. None of it was hard or long. The worst of what came down was to the south in Fort Lauderdale. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.
I dug out the wood for the face vase and the piece of wood given to me. There are two sets of knots in the wood and I was not sure how I wanted to cut it for the next face vase. I returned it to the shed.
The piece of wood I was given, was a chain sawed slab from the tree. I measured out the largest circle I could make and then cut that out. I then measured out three small circles in what was left and cut them out.
I used the disk sander to smooth out one side of the circle and then measured to find the center again. Always good to check it after bandsawing as I tried to stay proud of my lines by quite a bit. I used a wood face plate and double sided tape and mounted it on the lathe.
I was cutting end grain, which is not easy. this is dry wood which makes powder rather than slicing nicely. I ended up with a very nice bowl. I made a simple cup out of one piece of the wood. I am now thinking I should make goblets out of the other two pieces. I will use them to make the bowl and then use some other wood for the stem and base.
I took some bamboo dowels and made two Tunisian style crochet hooks. I added cords to the end and a cap at the other end of the cord. This is a style of crochet where one leaves loops on the hook for as wide as th piece you are making, and then remove the loops while hooking, back off. The cord is to allow one to make work longer than the hooks, and the cap on the end of the cord is to hold the loops on the cord until they are needed. It sounded like an interesting method of crochet so I decided to make hooks.
I carved two more cats. They have to be varnished and the faces have to be put on, but they look good. I also fixed the bottoms of the existing cats so they are flat and clean. They will get some varnish and then be signed and varnished again.
My first two cats are painted a dark brown. some of the painted on detail disappeared. I tried painting it a different color and I did not like the effect so I washed it off. I will try again later in the week. They need to be lightly colored for the detail to show.
The bowl and cup, and two newly carved cats
Tunisian crochet hooks
The cords are to hold extra stitches.
For next week, I will reconsider my face vase again. I will do the two goblet bowls. I have two more cat blanks to carve. I should make a few more. I also need to come up with my next ornaments to do. There are several kinds of ornaments from previous years that I need to make more copies of. I have other wood that needs to be used up. I also want to make some more crochet hooks.
I will see what I actually do next week.
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