Crafty Things

blossoms?!?! Congratulations on becoming an expectant parent!
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Forest Shepherd wrote:Unless you chop both your arms off!

Then you can only drink buckie through a flimsy straw the rest of your life and people make jokes about how handy you are to have around and how you really over-did it when they asked you if you could lend them a hand.

I love coming across something I forgot I had written that makes me laugh. We really do tend to love our own creations more than anyone else does.  

Anyway, here are some Christmas ornaments I made for my siblings (and one each for my niece and my mom). They have a back and front, as you can see:

Those are gorgeous, Forest! You've got a serious talent there.

I love them !! Id buy one or three from you !

I love those.

Glad you like them!
There was one more I forgot to get a picture of that I made for my sister. It had a little river-otter on the back.  

Really it's a surprisingly easy technique to pick up. The main difficult is maintaining control so that you don't cut too much, and keeping your blades sharp. I do get a lot of enjoyment out of the hobby, but I don't work at it enough. Hopefully I can dedicate myself more strongly to it, and work on something larger like a piece of furniture. (Made out of good wood too, not that darn glued-together crap that it took me so long to get through on the door!) ((Sorry no picture for that yet; I don't have a camera of my own.))

yeah making things is really satisfying. when I was a kid I used to make little houses out of scraps and bits and pieces people threw away.

I did a very little bit of wood carving at camp one summer when I was little, but that was ages ago and just with a pocket knife.  What kind of blades do you use for your pieces, out of curiosity? Is there any kind of specialized stuff?

Well I use a regular whittling knife for, you know... whittling. 
But those ornaments are chip-carved, which I did with just the one "cutting" chip knife (you can see a picture of it on the first page of this thread). Chip-carving knives are held differently and have fixed blades on them that are smaller than regular pocketknife blades.

Today I (probably the wrong way) took off the bubbled-up and old finish off of our large wooden mirror-frame, sanded it down, glued the fancy bits on the top back on, and put an initial layer of polyurethane on it. It's funny refinishing furniture: making it look new again.

I took a picture of that door finally.  

Close-up:



Overall:



The wood was rather rubbish for chip-carving -- it's partially fabricated and glued together -- and you can see rough spots in the close-up where I slipped up.

Ah, there seems to be cabins in the family already.

Ah yes, that's for the farm interns.

that's a beautiful door, love the colour of the wood and the design.

So do I its a good door Still fond of the little wooden ornaments at the top of this page !

I'm happy to be sleeping under this woodland creation, well, twiggy creation really I also had enough of my bog standard, social housing kitchen cupboards so, out they came took me days of pulling & tugging to be rid of it all, just the sink unit left now & Ive plans for that also. I like "Olde Worlde", real wood, organic, not laminated & plastic stuff. And I fractured my baby finger & dislocated the ring finger next to it. hurts like hell !

{{{ Wow! Very nice Azriel- worth the pain! Have a buckie to celebrate, soon forget about your finger, and then everthing you ever knew... (very suitable for Forumshires resident witch too ) }}

What a bed! Brilliant lighting effects.

I'm with you , I like wood, unpainted, thank you! I've got a good friend who disapproves, thinks it looks backward and uncouth. She's wrong - polished wood with a nice stain and oil finish can't be improved upon and it's a sin to cover it up.

Thankyou Petty Ive a snug place to chant & worry no gooder's polish up on my healing incantations.
I agree Halfy, stained & oiled wood, heavenly, so soft & silky to the touch. The cinemas of my youth were like that. Rich wooden staircases, bannisters smooth from years of hands sliding along them, Velvet drapes that revealed like a waterfall when the intro began & the smell ! The smell of polished wood permeated through. Why would you want anything else ??

that's flipping cool! wish I had a bed like that. its very Elven.

Oh 'eck, thankyou Its very simple to do, Find some tall pliable tree shoots, cut down, leave outside to bump off any creepy crawlies, bring in, attach to bed posts with cable ties (lots ) then wrap yards of twine around to hide ugly cable ties, bend stems how you like them, trim & add Christmas fairy lights. I found a curtain on the internet that had that lovely moon & trees thing going on so, hang it behind & there you go, I was happy & lucky Ive done a smaller version at the bottom of the bed also & I sleep SOOOO much better, tho I guess that could be suggestive. I cant think of many things worse than going to "Furniture Land", in the Sales, choosing mainstream furniture all churned out factory style. Even if homemade goes drastically wrong its better than run of the mill modernization.

I made a bow and quiver for my sister, for her birthday. It was back in June, but I took some pictures before I gave it to her (The arrows I bought separately).



You can see the red oak and pine layers here:



And the nock for the string. The string is synthetic thread, wound by me. It's not that good. Definitely getting something sturdier for the next attempt.



Leather hand-grip:



The quiver was supposed to be a little more organic, but I ended up making it out of mostly flooring material actually.  The walls are vinyl, and there's a piece of carpet in the bottom upon which the arrow-heads can rest. It hangs from the waist.



It works alright, I mean it probably has 30ish pounds to it, but that's okay for my sister. I'm just glad it didn't break like my last attempt!

That looks really cool, Forest! About how long is the bow when strung?

{{Damn impressive work Forest You're quite the craftsman }}

Wow. Did you do the oak and pine inlaying yourself, Forest? Is it a recurve? Quiver is cool looking.

Love the creativity As soon as you see it you want to go all Legolas & fire off some arrows. Well made.