Oh my goodness! Carving wooden spoons is just wonderful!
Hard work, yes. but…. ohhhh….
At Solstice of December 2020, I cajoled my husband to let me open an intriguing package instead of waiting until Christmas.
He said yes, and I was off down the most wonderful ‘Rabbit Hole’!
He had bought me a spoon carving kit that has a book, a Slodj knife and a hooked knife as well as a bass wood spoon blank. Here’s the link to the kit from Lee Valley (no affiliations, no profit in sharing the link, but I love their store and hope that they live long and prosper): LINK
The picture above is the first spoon I carved…. for our grandson.
My husband loved it, so I secretly carved one for him for Christmas, too.
I asked my family if they would like spoons, and the response was an enthusiastic yes!
So…
and
And, then….
I couldn’t resist combining one of my other great delights, which is carving wooden dolls, with spoon carving.
The inspiration that poured out kept me out of bed for a couple of nights as I had to sit and draw and draw and draw
all the ideas that were just pouring out….
I have tied in a few metaphors that have been weaving their way around in my heart…
On Facebook, I learned about stardust that has been discovered in Antarctica and then having a long time friend
sent me a poem about how the trees are full of stardust (as we all are) just enchanted me!
I am now carving what I call: ‘Storyteller Spoons’ – hand carved spoons that are meant to stir up STORIES, not soup.
After, stories are food for the Soul 🙂
Oooh! I had to carve a Star Baby spoon from walnut:
And, I have started a series of ‘Stardust Sisters Spoons’- articulated dolls with moving arms,
This one is carved from a blank that my son made for me from a birch tree that died and was cut down
in his neighbor’s yard:
I carved this Stardust Sister from the bass wood blank that came with the kit:
I love the metaphor of hearts and hands working together, so I went back to
the drawings that I did for the first scoop that I carved for my daughter.
But, I added a hand to the spoon, and carved out a bowl in the palm of the hand
as well as in the scoop of the heart.
While I was carving it, it came to me that spoons are meant to gather things,
but also to offer them, which is the perfect metaphor for this spoon:
I will be working with Hearts and Hands together a whole lot!
I made a video showing some of the carving that I have done over the last 30 odd years,
as well as the very very first beginnings of getting started in spoon carving.
These are just the first spoons that I have carved, and now that I have worked out
a pattern language for myself with this, there will be many, many more!
(I hope!) 😀
And, I hope that you are finding things that bring you joy, too!
All through the Covid pandemic, I have been working on designing and fine tuning a large new Teneriffe Lace loom that is my response to the situation that we are all in.
I wanted to create a loom that would be a way of celebrating love, compassion, kindness, resiliency, hope and friendship. The image that came up for me was of hearts and flowers.
So, I have designed a large Teneriffe Lace loom that is meant to be woven on with thicker yarns or threads than ‘normal’ and to be much larger than ‘normal’.
Here’s a video introduction to the loom. NOTE: The list of the ‘how to’ videos is further down this post.
At the beginning of March 2020, a very kind lady sent me a pair of ‘Polka’ Teneriffe looms to say thank you for all the hard work that I put into writing the ‘Potholder Loom Weaving’ book.
I was delighted with them- but didn’t like the way the foundation strand was put onto them.
So, I figured out a different way of continuously chaining on the foundation chain.
I also figured out a way of warping the loom continuously, and then had to work out the logistics of weaving the heart and flower motifs, and, also, how to get the motifs off the loom in a workable way.
I wove hundreds of samples and made dozens of variations on the looms.
Lots of them became firewood 🙂
BUT eventually I arrived at the configuration that I love.
Gary McFarland is the mastermind behind the CNC machine at Dewberry Ridge Looms and he has added his finesse to the final version of the loom.
One of my most favorite things to do at Christmas time is to make ‘the ornament of the year’ to give to family and friends. I usually end up making a LOT of them and it’s totally delightful.
This year, I have been weaving up a ton of tiny Snowmen- I designed them last year and made a video so other people can make them too.
If you would like to embellish your hand woven (or knitted or crocheted) fabric with embroidery, but aren’t quite sure how to do it, then I have some suggestions for you.
I have made a video showing one of the ways that I have figured out how to embroider on hand woven fabric- this technique will work just as well on crocheted or knitted fabric. Here’s the link to the video:
Here’s how to embroider on pin loom weaving:
Here’s how to embroider on hand wovens using the tambour chain stitch crochet technique:
Here’s how to stitch lucet cord to the edges of a handwoven piece:
Here’s how to make loop embellishments with lucet cord:
For links to video on how to upcycle cloth tea bags into Teabag Yarn, and how to weave triangles with it, please go to: LINK
I love finding fun and unique ways to upcycle things, and so I have had so much fun turning cloth tea bags into yarn and weaving with it, to make tutus for the Merrie Sunshine and Mermaid Minnie Moonbeam dolls.
For the main page about Merrie Sunshine and Minnie Moonbeam dolls, please go to: LINK
Here is the video that shows how to make the Upcycled Tea Bag Tutu:
One of my favorite things is to find creative new ways to make small looms even more useful by thinking ‘outside the box’ on how I weave with them. So, that’s what this video is about….
Here it is: Tips for Weaving with Teabag Yarn on the Diagonal on Potholder Looms-
By the way, I made a video showing how to upcycle cloth tea bags (not paper ones) to make Teabag Yarn.
If you want to weave with bulky yarn on a pin loom, it can be challenging.
I’ve made a video, using Upcycled Teabag yarn (here’s the link on how to make upcycled Teabag Yarn: LINK) as the bulky yarn for this example.
When you weave using 2 nails at a time on a pin loom, you can open up all kinds of possibilities for working with art yarns, fabric strip yarn and other bulky yarns.
It’s quick and easy and adds so much creative potential to pin loom weaving. Yay!
Here is a video tutorial about how to make sweet and simple doll clothes using triangles that are woven on small triangle or pin or potholder looms.
The video shows the doll clothes being modeled by the Merrie Sunshine and Minnie Moonbeam Mermaid wooden dolls, but the clothes will fit other dolls that are around 8 inches/20 cm tall.
For more information about the Merrie Sunshine and Mermaid Minnie Moonbeam dolls, please go to L I N K
HERE ARE A WHOLE BUNCH OF VIDEOS ABOUT HOW TO WEAVE TRIANGLES ON SMALL LOOMS:
This video shows how to weave triangles on 2 inch pin looms, but the technique is the same on any size square pin loom:
Here are 2 videos that show how to weave a triangle on the Potholder loom using yarn:
and
and here is how to weave a triangle on small triangle looms:
And how to weave a triangle on a Weave-It style pin loom: Note that you will need to weave 2 triangles and stitch them together to make them large enough to make the doll clothes in the video:
Here’s how to weave a triangle on the Martha Stewart loom:
No matter what loom you weave your little triangles on, I hope that you will find delight in using them to make simple doll clothes!
