It's been another busy couple of weeks - Sarah and I have been trying to get ready for the Buzzard Fay-re which is coming up, although we still haven't got our 'medieval' costumes ready yet (te-he!). A couple of weeks ago I decided to make my 1st chair, Sarah's been on at me to make one for quite a while but I wasn't sure how I wanted to make it. So, I decided to make it really simple.....

Which it turned out was anything but....

The main pieces have been reclaimed from one of the very old original window frames from the barn (over 130 yr old), the diagonal grooves running down either side are from the wooden slats that were originally fitted before any of the barns were fitted with glass. The rest of the pieces are odd bits of Oak that we've found lying all over the farm. Jim offered my favourite description when he called it "The Barn Kings' Throne".

It was originally going to be just 4 joints with just 4 pieces of wood - I ended up using 18 bits of wood so you get an idea of how much it's changed from it's original plan! As for the trouble it caused... Every piece of wood has warped on all 3 planes and the 4 main posts had rotten nails in them at every 1 inch - trashed 3 chisels and a router bit!

For those of you wondering; none of the wood has been stained! That is all from the natural aging of the wood.

The next thing I started on was this lovely little stool, the seat is another piece of reclaimed Oak from around the farm, the legs are bone oak - oak limbs that have dried and seasoned whilst still attached to the trees, because the full width of the limb is used there is no 'run-out' of the grain, this makes it extremely strong whilst still being flexible.

Now onto the exciting stuff; Bowls, platters & plates.

My turnings.

I tried a couple of bowls using bits that I've had lying around. Both bowls started off ok but as I went on it became apparent that choice of wood was far more critical.

The 1st bowl was oak, it was going really well and I was getting to the bottom of the bowl when a knot opened up and started curling inwards. just as I was making the last couple of passes with the chisel, it caught the knot and a massive hole suddenly appeared in the bottom of the bowl. I was just a bit disappointed as it had been going so well but....

The next attempt went even worse, the wood was too heavy and so unbalanced that it snapped the screw on my chuck. After quite a lot of effort to retrieve the snapped screw, I replaced it with a stronger pin chuck hoping this would be up-to the task.

Unfortunately not. The pin worked loose and become lodged in the wood - I didn't find out anything was wrong until I had finished the outside of the bowl and about to turn it round, desperate to save at least 1 attempt at my bowl turning I tried everything to dislodge the pin. In the end the only thing left was to split the bowl with an axe.

Even more disappointed.

So it seemed a trip to pick up some new wood was in order. Dear Jim, as usual, sorted me out with some lovely bits for turning; Quite a bit of Ash, some lovely Burr Oak, a nice chunk of gorgeous Spalted Beech and a nice piece of Cherry. The Ash was a mix of green backs (fresh cut edge pieces) and a seasoned plank and as this is a good uniform wood which works quite well I decided this would be a good place to start.

With a new choice of wood, picked especially for turning, the results were much better!

Anyway, I could ramble on about each bowl for ages but, as we are running out of time, for now I'll just leave you with piccies of a selection of bowls platters and a couple of small chopping boards that we are taking to the fair.