back to carving

Update on Farm – July 18^th, 2015

    It is starting out the day a muggy one, after another muggy one yesterday. Tried to finish a bear I was working on yesterday but the heat and humidity beat me down big time. I was able to finish another carving I had been reluctantly putting off a rising phoenix sculpture where I just couldn’t just get the feathering right, or at least to what I thought it should be. Today I plan on delivering the carving an ending the nightmare that has plagued me personally. I feel I have produced the best carving I can. Was it all I wanted it to be? Not necessarily. But then when you are carving in wood, do overs are rare, to come out with anything close to what I had envisioned is great, it is only my interpretation of the project that pulls me down, as if I was perfect.

    There are ways of fixing wood carvings too. You can glue another piece on and cut it back off to what you thought in the first place. When you sculpt in clay, you have the ability to make it right the first time, before casting in bronze or plaster, but with wood it is harder to make it right or exact he first time through. Duplicating matching pieces or building furniture can have the same harrowing results when attempting repetitive projects, say scrolls etc. . Deformities in the wood, knots, and cracks, etc. cause their own special problems to be dealt with as you go along.

      As a chainsaw carver I am not that particular about which way the grain runs, or how it will affect the overall carving. Instead it is all about proportion and making it work. Trying to fit what you have in your mind into the piece of wood in front of you. You can’t worry about all the other stuff if the project you are working on doesn’t fit in the piece of wood or if you cut to deep. what are the ramifications of that? Every bear or carving has its own special circumstances you have to deal with as you go along.

    Well rain has played a significant role in my plans this summer, in some cases setting me back in my plans. I had planned on having started the foundation for my new addition, but I am still making hay. I also hoped to be able to saw out timbers I need for my house to set them to drying for next spring, for when I start erecting the rest of the structure. Another problem I have had is the duck setting on her nest just outside my door. Yesterday I pulled back the side of the teepee tent to reveal her to some potential customers, my white chicken was also there sitting alongside the duck, who is still sitting on her nest incubating the eggs below her. Hopefully she will be off the nest with some young’uns within the week.

    I had thought about just carving enough carvings to buy me a band sawmill, but at 6000 for a cheap band saw mill , this isn’t going to happen either. Instead I will carve to buy parts I still need for the mill I still yet have to build. Don’t know how this is going to all play out in the coming months to see if I am able to stay on schedule for finishing my addition on the house.

     The potato tower and tomato tower are doing well and the vertical wall around the pool is doing well also as it is starting to fill in. I will need to start thinking about adding solar water heating to pool to continue to use it into wintertime. Still have plenty of work to do, and I am again taking orders for carvings as well will be carving out some different ideas I want to pursue and will share with you as I go along. I guess as long as I have plans I will always have something to do to keep me busy. Really don’t know what it would be like to not have anything to do or be bored.