About time

Sorry, it's been ages since I've posted. Richard called me yesterday to ask what's been going on and considering I've been off on half term, where are all the posts? Well sadly, I haven't had much time for making recently. We've been doing a lot of DIY on the house and I spent the first four days of half term in Belgium on a school trip to see the WWI battlefields. I did get to do some stuff though starting with this sycamore bowl.

I have to say that this is a complete rip off of a beautiful bowl by Jim Sannerud. Please don't check out the original as it makes mine look rubbish.
On Friday my mate Nick came around with some big slabs of oak that he wants to plane down. I've not had much opportunity to work with oak, but this stuff is great, the smell is amazing. I'm going to help him with this, and he's assured me that there's plenty left, so I'm hoping to bag me a log that I can convert into a joined stool.

Nick has also just bought himself a lathe, so I offered to show him some of the basics. We put a chunk of sycamore on and he had a bit of a play. When he left I turned his test piece into this candlestick. If I get a chance I'll make a few more to go with it this week.