(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-30-14 Saturday
96 degrees, brisk breeze carrying the heat away, blue sky with lots of thin clouds that never seemed to really block the sun. One baby cloud’s diaper leaked on us for a moment as we were walking from the car to a yard sale and it was over before we got there. The wind was perfect for under the awning, blowing in on the right angle to really keep it cool under there. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach department of Tourism.
We saw on a county map that the Pompano area Mom lives in is on a ridge that has a 15 foot elevation. Most of the rest of the county is at a 10 foot elevation above sea level. I know that the highest natural points in the county is an ancient sand dune that is 29 feet above sea level. Of course we have overpasses now that seem like they are a hundred feet up in places.
In yard sailing, our normal area was devoid of yard sales. We did see in a local flier about a yard sale over in Deerfield Beach, which is on the other side of the US-1 / A1A just north of us. We drove through the back ways heading North and we accidentally found a yard sale. We finally went across the highway and we found more yard sales. We ended up doing well.
I got a 1956 cook book that is made up of a bunch of booklets. They were national and regional recipes. I really had no use for it but cannot resist old cook books since my favorite two recipes are from 1949.
I got some political joke books, a spice mincer, a wand blender of a design I like, a pair of straight razors, some playing cards I got for a game I got a few weeks ago, and a travel fishing pole set. I think I spent like $16 total.
I have wanted to get my hands on real straight razors for a long time. The last time I saw some at a yard sale, they were like twenty dollars each. One of these has a broken handle. I think I can replace that when I get to it. These have a really thick back of the blade and the sides cove in strongly to the edge. I figured out within moments that this forces the edge at exactly the right angle when stropped or sharpened. They need sharpening.
There were several ideas for getting them. One idea a very long ago was to make one into a carving knife. Razors have the blade characteristics great for carving. They are hard, and can be made sharp. I have tested the sharpness of my blades by shaving the hair on my arms. I know the basic concept of shaving with a blade. Actual practice is something else. In practice, I figure I would shave as well as Don Knotts shaved. He nicked the mirror several times.......
straight razor blades
I have a game kit with 9 different games. It was supposed to have a deck of cards in it. That was gone. The playing cards were a quarter a piece and I got four as I did not want to deal with change. I am glad I did. One card set was Pinochle deck. I put an unopened CARNIVAL CRUISE LINE deck in the game set along with the Pinochle set so I added another game.
decks of playing cards.
I once had a wand blender, maybe a decade ago but have no idea what happened to it. A couple times this year, I would have loved to have one. I had heard and read recommendations for the best design of the blenders and this one fits everything I would consider good.
wand blender
While looking at the books that Mom has. I glanced in a CROCK POT cook book. It had bread recipes. I had given thought over the past month of making bread. Looking at the recipe, it was simple. You put the bread or cake dough into a pan and put the pan inside the crock pot. The crock pot becomes an oven. Since I am off Monday, this gave me the idea of making bread this weekend.
1956 cook book
spice mincer
After Yard Sailing, we took what was supposed to be a short nap. It stretched into the afternoon. We then went for Chinese food and then had to digest that.
I went out to pet and feed the cat several times, photograph my finds, and I looked around, but that was all that I did outside. No wood working.
I do intend to do wood working tomorrow. I have about six dozen projects in mind but much has to depend on what I am in the mood to do.
I will see what I do tomorrow.
Year 15, Week 32, Day Two (week 729)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
08-31-14 Sunday
95 degrees, blue skies with fast moving puffs zipping by. The sun ignored them and shone right through them. A brisk breeze helped a lot. The wind angle was not as good as yesterday, though. In Sunrise there was a spot of showers, but it was always dry in Pompano. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach department of Tourism.
After taking care of a few things my truck needed, I got to moving equipment out of the way so I could get to the band saw. I wanted to test at least one of the Christmas Ornament ideas I had. I cut two sticks of 12 inch long two by two. On one I drew a shape of a Christmas Stocking, then a second one to use some of the wood. I then started cutting. I cut both out of the board, then cut each blank in half as stockings did not have to be that thick.
I looked at the cuttings and thought it would be nice to come up with a use for all those pieces, but it does not pay to hang onto them until then. When you find a need for a piece, it is usually faster and easier to cut a new piece than figure out where the stock is and then find something that will work. I tossed them in the garbage.
stock wood, blanks and trimmings.I can still get several more from the stock board. I used a few of the small pieces of trimmings for presents inside the sox.
I sat down and started carving and shaping. The rough shape was already made, the main thing was to round and detail the sock. I made them fur socks with thicker white at the top. I then decided it could be hollowed out a little and using my knife and a chisel, I gouged out the inside of the lip some. I then realized it would be great to have some presents in there.
I went to the garbage and dug out the pieces I had tossed. They were on top of some stuff already in there and easy to find. I trimmed a couple pieces, then cut them into small segments, and then touched them with paint.
Since I was testing to see how these will look and whether they will work as ornaments, I painted the sox and then glued in the little pieces to look like packages.
Now one of the sox was not completely shaped as it was the second cut. While the paint was drying on one, I started this second type of blank. I left the top on an angle and went with the design. I got them both painted and the presents glued in.
These are not my favorite design of ornament, but they are fast and they are the first design I have tried this year. I need a dozen of these made. I also need three more designs that I can carve and have ready before November, preferably, but definitely before December.
I am working out the best place to put the hooks on these. I think placing the hook so the toe points down and the presents are visible would likely be the best place for the hook.
These need touch up paint, maybe a little better color selection for the heal and toe. I was working fast and used what I grabbed quickly.
finished stiockings, except for paint touch ups, and the blanks they were from.
I decided to start some bread this morning. I had some dough starter in the freezer, I would let my bread rise once and take some of the dough for the next batches, freezing them till later. Because of the way I had handled the dough, it became a sour dough. The last time I made bread, I made a multi grain bread, so one ball was regular and the other multi grain. I decided I was going to combine them for this batch of bread since they are quite old and need to be used.
I broke the balls of dough into small pieces and then added the liquid. I then used the wand I got yesterday to puree the dough into the liquid before I started adding flour. At the moment of this writing, the dough is sitting to rise.
RED MILLS is a grain company. You can get whole grains of nearly every kind in the world, in rough ground grain for hot cereals, and flours. They also have bread mixes where all you have to do is to add liquid and oil. It comes with the yeast in the package. I have a package of their multi grain bread mix and am thinking about starting to fix that tomorrow morrow morning.
The nice thing about bread making is that you can do a whole lot of other stuff while waiting for certain steps to do their job such as rising.
I have work to do around the house so I won’t be going out or doing wood working.
I do have definite plans for wood working next weekend. A few more ornaments would help.
I will see what I actually do next weekend.
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