They say you can’t.
I don’t know who They are, so I’m ignoring them.
I say you can!
A little idea I had a while ago and have now, quite literally, hammered it into reality. No idea if people will want them, but hey, I had fun with a hammer 🙂
These two sets are now available at Homemade Wales, let’s see how they go and perhaps I’ll go on the hunt for more spoon/fork combos.
Cake fork, pastry fork, call it what you will. Norman, if you like. Either way, it’s a small fork with a wider tine for slicing through your cake. Or pastry (but not Norman).
Regardless of nomenclature, these lovely forks are the latest addition to the range of hand stamped vintage cutlery presently available via Homemade Wales.
Each one is different on account of being stamped by hand, and the style of fork/handle (insert Two Ronniess quirk here) varies according to the stock available.
Simple, but I like to think quite jolly.
The first play with a bit of the recently acquired pear tree has rendered some rather lovely results, if I do say so myself! The chunk on the left of the picture below was chopped a bit more and popped on the whirly machine (lathe) and the results were very pleasing indeed.
Here’s the video footage of the bowl being made. It’s speeded up quite a bit, but slowed back down for the fun bits like the nail I found buried inside, and the cake…
https://youtu.be/7vSWinW8t6M
So here it is, the first proper bowl I’ve made from green wood. #happywiththat
A few days later…
So… turning green wood is fun. It’s a lot more forgiving on the blades than hard dry stuff, and the aroma can be delightful. But it’s green, so it’s full of moisture, and that moisture will evaporate at some point. In this case, ‘the point’ was over a couple of days after turning the bowl. Not really surprise as the amount of wood left was/is little enough that any moisture hasn’t got far to go before finding freedom. So the bowl dried out quickly, the crack that was already there got bigger, and I thought it was going to split in half pretty quickly. It didn’t do that in the end, but the warping was fascinating to watch.
The finish I’d put on (just wax) has deteriorated too, especially on the inside, but that can be easily remedied. All part of the learning curve!
The warping has actually given a nice ‘scoop’ to the rim, so hasn’t made it total bin feed. I can see now why some turners like to work with ‘green’ and just let it do its thing for an organic and unique end result each time. There will be more…
To see a video of this bowl being turned, there’s a separate article here, and/or you can visit my YouTube Channel.
So after a play with some ornament tubes that needed a pen mandrel on the lather, I thought it was maybe a fun idea to have a go at making pens. Might as well; got the kit now…
The Lovely Lady H chose her desired types and I set to work. Not such a difficult task really, but my ignorance of what’s actually required came to light within, oo bout five minutes! And now I have most of the gear, so now I can make pens. And I’m going to make more.
It didn’t take long for a special request to come in, so shortly after the first four were created, this wooden ‘bolt action’ one was made for a friend. People keep wanting ’em, so hey… I’ll keep making ’em 🙂
What’s that? A new style of cookery chefery? Why no, it’s just craftery.
By using the kit and caboodle normally used for making pens, I decided to make some small ‘Easter Tree’ ornaments. Some were made from pencils in the same basic style as my Christmas baubles, while some were made with different types of wood stuck together (segmented turning that’s called; sounds awfully technical) and some from a bit of beech tree that I’d had stored for a while that had grown some lovely patterns through its grain (“spalting” sounds so much better than “fungal growth”).
So here’s a quick video of one of the latter being turned.
(Please do go and view this on my YouTube Channel too, so the numbers can go up nicely 🙂 )
https://youtu.be/ZESAVlCetqg
The final touches were made with brass loops and finial thingies, and look like this:
These are available via Homemade Wales, if you’d like to buy some!
When I was a child – so not that long ago – I used to love fresh bread, cut nice and thick on my mum’s bread board and slathered in great dollops of butter. I sense you salivating there. Steady now…
Anyway, that very same bread board was there when I was small, and still there when I was less small, and up until not long ago when I was even less less small, it was still there. But it was tired. VERY tired.
Mum wanted a new one but couldn’t find what she wanted; something similar to what she’d had for many (many) years. Odd really; just a wooden board with a slot in it for the knife.
At about the time I realised the board was on its last legs (do boards have legs?) I’d been given a stack of wood by someone in the village who had inherited it from a recently passed craftsman (the sort of chap who made guitars, rocking horses, and other fine things). A few pieces, I was told, were cherry, but I wasn’t (and still aren’t) so sure. I think it may be black or English walnut, but suffice to say it’s lovely. In fact, most of the pictures of spoons on this website have it in the background.
In a nutshell then, I made my mum a new bread board. I didn’t make the knife, but I did create a nice slit for it to slot into.
Finished with several applications of Danish oil it’s food safe and looks flippin’ gorgeous in my humble opinion. And, more importantly, Mum loves it.
How’s this for a jolly fine bit of magic makery?
For those that don’t know, my ‘day job’ is an entertainer; a magician to be precise. Fun eh? I get to travel about all over the place performing for all kinds of lovely people at weddings, business events, house parties, etc. etc. I’m also half of a double act and am Creative Director at SideShow Events, and there we have a number of comedy character acts that also travel all over the place to entertain the masses. In December of 2015 we were asked to create bespoke ‘Harry Potter’ style characters for a major event in the centre of Cardiff, so what better excuse could there be to make some posh wands?
The main picture up the top there shows my lovely wand next to the chunk of wood it came from. Well, the next bit along the chunk anyway; the next wand was soon to come from that bit too.
I’m thinking these types of thing might be a good retail idea… what say you?
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