Child Powered Lathe

A couple of shots taken at the schools part of Countryside Live by the Lee Valley Park's photographer...
Unfortunately the camera's gone wrong so it's gone back to the shop.

I like my child powered lathe.  For two days there is a never-ending queue of willing workers so I can't be accused of exploitation.

Mrs Treewright showing the kids how the spinning tops work...

I'll be demonstrating at The European Woodworking Show at Cressing Temple Barns this weekend.  It's a great venue and is shaping up to be an interesting show - might be worth a trip out?

Countryside Live x2

Looks like someone was enjoying herself having a go on the lathe yesterday at Highgate Wood.

We're going to the Lee Valley Park to do Countryside Live for the kids on Wednesday and Thursday then we're going back on Saturday and Sunday when it will be open to the public (£3 - free for kids).

We've decided to donate these to the Countryside Foundation for Education for their auction. 

I made them ages ago as a prop for the stall with Lime from Syon Park.  They've served us well but I think it's time to make some new things.

Early Autumn in Epping Forest

There are lots of different types of mushroom everywhere at the moment but which of these would you eat?

I'm not that fond of mushrooms anyway but if I was desperate would probably eat the first one as I'm pretty sure it's a Penny Bun.

Sunshine Plain was certainly living up to its name yesterday and we met the 4 English Longhorns that are put out by the City of London to graze there to keep the plain open.

We also spotted this Tree Sprite...

...looking for its young one.

Received this photo from Walter and Anna using the stool that I made for them earlier in the Summer. They were taking part in a living history event at a reconstructed medieval fishing village near Ostend in Belgium.

She said...
"The stool has been out and about a fair bit in these last few months and we still think it’s great and love it to bits.  There’s just a tiny bit of warp in it from drying out, but that’s absolutely fine and it’s solid as a rock.  Everyone in the York City Levy, our re-enactment group, thinks it’s fab."

***

We'll be at Highgate Wood Heritage Day tomorrow if any local blog readers wanted to pop by and say hello.

Cherry Wood

Went down to Tim Gatfield’s Cherry Wood Project with Jon Warwicker to help out on Volunteer Thursday.

We slept 2 nights in this wonderful little log cabin...

The aerial loo...

We worked on building legs and bracings to support the ends of the joists for a new, large yurt platform...

This sort of arrangement is necessary as the woods are on a steep slope.

The place is called St Catherine's and we went to the Catherine Wheel pub at the nearby village of Marshfield - quite appropriate as St Catherine is the patron saint of turners.

Party in the Woods

We had a great time at The Party in the Woods on Saturday.  It was in a clearing in the middle of Reffley Woods - a site owned by the Woodland Trust on the outskirts of King's Lynn.  The weather couldn't have been more perfect.

Jo was making willow dragonflies...

There was storytelling, fairy face painting and wandmaking, hurdlemaking, shelter building, African drumming in the woods, a cafe and three very fine musicians playing next to my lathes...

My freshly felled timber was dragged out of the woods to me courtesy of Bob the Cob...

This particular Birch butt proved to be the most awkward and intractable log I've ever had the misfortune to try and get into and led to a lot of sweating and swearing (2 axes and a froe were stuck in it at one point!) - thankfully the ash they brought later on was much more amenable and various items were turned including a new handle for Jeremy's lawn roller...

We had a couple of walks and paddles on the beach at Snettisham and all in all the weekend felt more like a mini-break rather than work.

Wotsit 2

Dave Malkin on the pitch next to us at Hainault at the weekend had this interesting looking gizmo...

Any ideas?