Mike's Christmas present

Mike's wife Liz treated him to a days woodturning tuition as a Christmas present.
Mike has done a couple of woodland courses using a pole lathe which he enjoyed but no doubt he found this a lot easier on the leg.
It was a very relaxed day and Mike turned a very nice Beech bowl.
Mike is involved in our country's security so I have excluded his face in the picture of him and his bowl
Very well done Mike I hope Liz is pleased with her bowl

Kevan's Bowl

Keven my Student today was here for a days woodturning experience and probably had no intentions of being a Woodturner but I think he might well have changed his mind. Keven obviously enjoyed his day today as he was very enthusiastic and really got stuck in.
I would be very surprised if Keven did not take up turning as he obviously enjoyed it and took to it like a duck to water.
Here are a couple of pics I took today and as you can see Keven did justice to a stunning bit of Sycamore turning a beautiful wide rimmed bowl.
A hobby of Keven's is Pyrography and this is part of the reason he made a wide rimmed bowl so that he could do some pyro on the rim.

What beautiful figuring on the bottom of this Sycamore Bowl

 More beautiful figuring

 Very well done Keven that is a beauty

A very pleasant day with Tim

Tim's wife Catherine treated him to a days woodturning tuition as a Christmas present and I am pleased she did because he was very good company. I do not like working on a weekend but sometimes it is the only day a Student can make it. As Tim was such good company and easy to teach I can honestly say I enjoyed today.
Tim got on so well he even had time to do some colouring.
Thank you Tim for making life easy for me today it is very much appreciated

I hope Catherine was pleased with the colour of the rim

A busy week

Another three students today that is five up to now this week and one more to come. Normally I would only teach a maximum of three but as these were a father and two sons I made an exception. They were easy company which made it an easy enjoyable day and they went away with a very presentable Beech bowl each as the pics will show.
Thank you Pete Dave and Steven I enjoyed the day as I am sure you did.

 Steven's blank was particularly nice and it was not easy to turn but the result made it all worth while

 As you can see there was a lot of figuring in it.

Sandra and Francis

Today mother and daughter Sandra and Francis were here for a days woodturning tuition.
This was a birthday present for Sandra from her children.
As you can see from the following picture they both did very well turning a couple of lovely bowls from some beautiful spalted Beech.
Sandra's has a green rim to go with the colour scheme in her house and Francis beaded hers.

Cedar of Lebanon

On Tuesday of this week at about two O clock we arrived home after two weeks away on a Cruise, at about four thirty Val a neighbour came in and told me the very next day they were having a large tree cut down in their front garden.
I was familiar with the tree as we used to live opposite them it was a Cedar of Lebanon about forty feet high.
Never refusing free wood if it is something interesting I told her I would be pleased to have it and I would make her something nice from it.
I got up a bit late for me on Wednesday morning about eight O clock because I was tired from our holiday too much food and too much booze.
By the time I got there the tree surgeon and crew had all the branches of the tree cut off and were about to fell the main trunk in three pieces as it was quite close to the house.
They asked me how much of the trunk I wanted and being greedy I said I would take the lot.
I guess the trunk must have been at least two tons because my van was well overloaded but it was only one hundred yards from my workshop so  I didn't worry about it.
As soon as I got it home I started processing it into blanks but at the end of the day I was less than half way through so I called on my Brother Chris to come and help me on the Thursday because I have six students next week and I wanted my van empty and my workshop clear.
Here are some pics I took

The first one shows all the wood packed into my can from the floor to the roof. As you can see it is beautiful wood

The bowl blanks are the ones I did on my own on the Wednesday the squares are cut to thickness ready to be cut into rounds

Me cutting the wood to thickness

 Brother Chris cutting to thickness we took it in turns as this is quite hard on the arms and shoulders after a while

 Cutting the squares into round Bowl blanks

 A couple of pics of me cutting into rounds

 We finally ended up with one hundred and ninety seven bowl blanks and about fifty Hollow form and fruit blanks.

 This is about half of the off cuts our Son Mark took the rest Wednesday night and our Daughter Tracey took these today

 All the bowl blanks ,Hollow form and fruit blanks in the van which we delivered to our stre in Bridgwater.
Two hard days work but worth it I expect these to be dry enough to turn in about three years