Wooden Bird Puppet

I made this puppet this

afternoon for my nephew.

Oak wood Carved Frog

This is a frog I made when attending a wood carving course in Bristol. It is made with Oak the main body is carved in the round and the hands and feet are relief carved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Carved twist on Turned candle holder in Hornbeam

A few weeks ago my friend John came home with some mystery wood which we soon decided is Hornbeam. It turns out it good for turning and alright to carved when its still a bit green, so I turned 2 beads at the end and followed instructions from a  wood carving book for drawing our and cutting a twist using a tenon saw and carving chisels. The tool cuts made me realise how useful it is to round off the corners of gouges which I will try and do soon as it makes it easier to use the whole curve of the tool.

Spoon for Becky and Lemon Squeezer

Here is a spoon that I made for my friend Becky to take away travelling round south America. It is made from apple wood and is smaller then most spoons because Becky doesn’t like big spoons. I’m getting much better at not using sand paper!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Birch Ladle

Whilst coppicing at Leigh woods with Rypelwood I found the Ladle branch Ive been waiting for, a birch branch which I then went on to carve into ladle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Low relief flower

Today I decided to try a low relief carving using a set of Henry taylor tools i was given as a present a few years ago. I also tried to undercut some parts such as the leaves and petals. The hardest bit i found as ever was getting a smooth finish all over at the end without working away more and more wood.

This was the first time I have carved lime which is lovely to cut, I was given a piece when volunteering coppicing Leigh woods with Rypelwood a couple of weeks ago.

Whittling chain and ball in a cage

These are two whittling things that are really quite pointless but i have wanted to do for quite a long time. The chain was extremely time consuming, it took about 7  or 8 hours in total to carve. I think it helped using Whittling and Woodcarving book by E.j. Tangerman, and using some pine which was soft and easy to carve.

The ball in a cage, again with pine took a lot less time then i expected, after making the chain at least. The chain i used a new trick my friend Tommy told me by covering it in linseed oil then leaving it in a plastic bag so you i don’t have to soak it in a vat of oil that i don’t have, seems to have worked quite nicely.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whittled roosters

The idea of making these roosters came from a book ‘Whittling twigs and branches’ by Chris Lubkemann, I painted certain parts to make them look more like roosters, and am improving on curling my tales on each one. I drilled holes on random bigs of scrap wood to sit them in.

There are photos of the process of making them in the gallery, the one shown below is the third, and therefore has the best tail curl.

Whittled man

This man has taken me a very long time to make, I have axed out the blank and then sat doing bits here and there and although i feel like the final finish could be a little neater I felt like it was time to finish it! I painted him in acrylics and carved him out of apple wood.

The reason it took so long is because my proportions from the start meant the blank was to thick so I probably carved about 3 different little men before this one appeared. His head was also much to big for quite a while, and maybe still is a little at the end.

I found the book Whittling and wood carving by W. Tangerman pretty useful for advice on certain cuts and most of it I used a 1 inch pick knife for after cutting my thumb on the small sloyd knife which was too long to use the tip of to get in all the nooks and crannies.

there are more photos in the gallery.

Fruit bowl carved with the adze

This was a slightly time consuming thing to make as the only wood big enough I had available was seasoned Ash. I followed instructions from Jogge Sunquists DVD on dough bowl and spoon carving, first splitting the blank, flattening the bottom, drawing the bowl shape on the top, adzing out the middle, carving the final surface of the inner bowl, axing the outside shape, then cleaning up with a draw knife and cabinet scraper.

The final bowl I then oiled with food grade linseed oil, and beeswax finish. I was also

trying out my new Ray Iles large drawknife which is very flat and a nice improvement from my other one.

For more photos about the process please view the gallery.