Gingerbread Bird Feeder

My mother has tried her hand on something a bit different this year. She has made “ordinary” gingerbread houses too (I will post them later), but she also made this.

Two Bobbin Lace Doilies

My mother was busy over the summer and today I finally could take pictures of these two big doilies – just under 40 cm in diameter.

Simple Finish Knives

I have made twoo puukko. To be honest, I was not a fan of this type of knife at all. I have only decided to make them just as a part of my ongoing knifemaking education. But now I am totally a convert.

The first one has a handle made from birch bark, cow bone, and white brass. It looks a bit like a stacked leather handle but it feels different in the hand. Birchbark can be flattened by boiling it in hot water and pressing it between two boards to cool and dry off, making it into flat hard sheets. They are slightly more brittle than wood, but they do not have any preferred failure direction, so they do not split and break easily.

The second one has a handle from birch wood with a small burl in it. It is not proper burlwood, it was just a piece of firewood that I thought will be interesting. I think I was correct in that surmise. The endcap and bolster are from pakfong.

Both of these knives have just a simple finish to them. The blades’ primary bevels were ground only up to 120 grit and then tumbled after quenching in sand as long as it took to take all the scale off. Bolsters and end caps are not highly polished, as well as the handles. In fact, I took a steel brush to them to roughen the surfaces a bit. And the finish is just several layers of ordinary boiled linseed oil.

I was aiming for a simple, rough-looking sturdy knife as well as a simple, easy-ish manufacturing process. I think I have managed both. I really like these knives and I will make at least somewhat fancy sheaths for them. And I will definitively make more puukko in the future. I also think that this design is ideal for recycling old files into knives, so I will probably do some of that too.

Dinosaur Tracks

We had our first dusting of snow today. And some little birb left these tiny footprints on our pavement.

Frosty Morning Walk – Part 6 – Frosty Leaves

And one cobweb. Frost is very beautiful. It would be more beautiful if it were pleasantly warm, but one cannot have everything.

An Experimental Kitchen Knives Set

This set is numbered, but I won’t be selling it. I have tried several new things whilst making it and it was designed in part with a focus on ease of manufacture, except the experimental dimples in the blades.

The stand is made from three slabs of massive black locust wood and the front of the knife stand, the bolsters, and the end caps on knife handles are made from a coconut shell. Fitting the curved coconut shell perfectly to a piece of wood is of course not possible, and I have solved that problem quite successfully by dyeing the epoxy glue dark brown.

The finish is simply drying oil (commercial “Teak oil” which is a mixture of various oils) applied in several layers daily for over a week. It is still a bit tacky to the touch, but that should solve itself in time and with use. The surfaces are not overly polished – I did not go above 330 grit for both the metal and the wooden parts. Black locust wood has big pores in its growth rings, so polishing it very highly makes little sense anyway. I have, in fact, brushed the wood with a steel brush to accentuate the pores.

I tried to make divots in the blades to make them less sticky to food, but it did not work out, they have too small a diameter to have any noticeable effect (I think). I will either have to build a tool to make these divots wider or to make very shallow fullers reliably and reproducibly. Neither of those two tasks is easy and I do not currently have any ideas.

The handles are not of an overly complicated shape, they have simply hexagonal profiles with some curvature to the facets and smoothed edges. They are reasonably easy to make and comfortable in the hand. The tang is held not only with glue but also with a nut on the end, which is covered by the coconut shell endcap.

I think these three knives should cover just about any task that an ordinary home cook needs to do in their kitchen. I hope. I have given the set now to my mother to test and I have forbidden her to use any other knife for the time being under the serious threat of confiscating her other knives. She has got instructions to use and abuse them to test them thoroughly. If they pass the test, I will make multiple sets (without the divots in the blades) for sale.

I have also been thinking of adding this kind of picture in the future to my blades when I offer them for sale on the interwebs, to save myself the trouble of having to write the sizes in words for each piece. What do you think about that idea?

Frosty Morning Walk – Part 5 – Find the Fly

Avalus has sent this absolutely gorgeous picture of a fly thawing of frost in the early morning sun.

Now try to find the fly in this picture (solution below the fold).

[Read more…]

Frosty Morning Walk – Part 4 – Frost On a Thistle

I do not remember ever seeing a thistle flower with frost on it. Hereabouts they are generally all ripe and fluffy when the frost comes.

With or without frost, thistles are surely beautiful.

Frosty Morning Walk – Part 3 – An Orange Flower

Just like avalus, I have no clue whatsoever what flower this is. And I also agree that it is beautiful, both with the ice crystals as well when covered with tiny water droplets after they melt.

Frosty Morning Walk – Part 2 – The WOODPECKER

Avalus has seen this fellow peck at the grass. What a peaceful frosty morning picture – a bright-colored dinosaur mercilessly massacring an underground ant’s nest.

Fosty Morning Walk – Part 1

Avalus went on a walk one frosty morning and he was kind enough to take his camera and make some beautiful pictures. So let’s begin with some moody shots of colorful fall landscapes.

Sunflower Residence – Butterflies Finale

This is the last post of this series this year. I was saving up something special – Aglais io, the peacock butterfly. These butterflies are so ridiculously beautiful that some of the pictures look fake.

Sunflower Residence – Some More Butterflies

I forgot to publish the rest of my pictures. So today small tortoiseshell.

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Gingerbread Bird Feeder

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Two Bobbin Lace Doilies

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Simple Finish Knives

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Dinosaur Tracks

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Frosty Morning Walk – Part 6 – Frosty Leaves

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An Experimental Kitchen Knives Set

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Frosty Morning Walk – Part 5 – Find the Fly

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Frosty Morning Walk – Part 4 – Frost On a Thistle

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Frosty Morning Walk – Part 3 – An Orange Flower

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Frosty Morning Walk – Part 2 – The WOODPECKER

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Fosty Morning Walk – Part 1

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Sunflower Residence – Butterflies Finale

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Sunflower Residence – Some More Butterflies

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