Woodn't you like to know...: A Catch Up

Its been a long time since I've been blogging proper, so I should have plenty to say... Life has been busy at work and at play but I have managed to shoehorn in plenty of woodworking over the past few months. Here is a breakdown...

Bodging

I have joined the APTGW - VERY exciting. I have been spooning and turning and making my own lathe, more on that in a post to follow. I also went to the Bodgers Ball in Herstmonceux, Sussex. I met some nice people and took sneaky photos of plenty of lathes for inspiration. The competition entries were very interesting too for inspiration and ideas. I have been doing lots of camping for various weekend meets at woodland around the county. The Kent group puts on lots of meets for locals where there are lots of like-minded people who have plenty of knowledge to share. www.bodgers.org.uk

Spoonfest

Spoons took a bit of a back seat as I struggled with time management but I got to Spoonfest this year in Edale, Derbyshire. This is always a great weekend where I made lots of new friends, caught up with old ones, spent too much money and carved and swapped some spoons. As you would suspect, lots of nerdy spoon-chat went on and plenty of spoons were carved. A surprise contender for favourite spoon wood was also found - Rowan - one to watch out for. The standard of carving this year was incredible with carvers from all over the world. Highlights for me included a Bark Craft demonstration by Keith Mathews and a chip carving workshop with Simon Hill - The King in the North (of chip carving). Lots and lots of ideas to try and some tips and tweaks of my designs from Spoon Doctor Jamie. Well done to Barn and Robin for organising the event for the third time. www.spoonfest.co.uk

Spoonclub

Unfortunately life has prevented me from visiting more than once, but I managed to get to one meet of the Herts Spoon Club. Nice people and nice soup. Bit of a jaunt up from Kent but I'll try to get up there again if possible. As with Spoonfest it's great to see other peoples work for a change.

Sweden

A pilgrimage of Slojd led us to Stockholm which had some amazing museums including the Vasa Museet, Nordisca Museet and Skansen, with forays out to the ancient Viking town of Birka. Unfortunately although the museums are incredible the light levels inside generally were not and as such the photos are poor... Select highlights below.