Tag Archives: spoon carving

January 16, 2021 · 10:43 pm

Carving Spoon Dolls as a Way to Make Sense of the World

I have been pondering and mulling and thinking and feeling and questioning and reeling from world events.

To soothe and heal the stress and anguish that watching the unfolding of the dramas out in the world,

I have been using the power of metaphor and the physical process of carving my wooden spoon dolls.

to start to make sense of things, I felt like I needed to re-connect to nature.

Immersing myself in carving wood that has come from trees that lived and then died in our neighborhood is a powerful way of connecting to the energy of the earth, the stars, the rain, the sun, the snow….

I began last week’s carving with a Tree Spirit Spoon Doll…

As I was carving her, I realized that from now on, all the bowls of my spoon dolls need to be heart shaped-

They are invocations of Love.

Carving images of love and connection made me think a lot about sisterhood and how precious dear friends are.

These two little Sister Spoons were directly influenced by all the thousands of Comfort Bears that I have made over the years.

I wondered if I could combine the softness of lucet cord handspun (alpaca and wool) yarn with the solidity of wood to create

‘Comfort Sisters’.

The answer is, ‘Yes’…..

Our neighbors on both sides have babies and toddlers and I love watching them blossom.

I want them to grow up in a world that is in much better shape than it is now.

I want them to live in a world where people are kind!

So, this Spoon Doll is dedicated to the Little Ones, who deserve to have the Book of Kindness being a guidebook for everyone.

 

I was thinking about accountability and responsibility and the image of a very firm, loving, but ‘Listen Here!” Granny

who laid out a couple of really important rules and guidelines emerged.

 

As I was carving her, I loved the feeling of the gouge lifting petals of wood up,

and the feeling of ‘Yes-ness’ about working with a precious material that is a living thing- the lifestuff of trees.

 

Trees are ancient and don’t need rules the way people seem to….

Here are Granny’s Rules:

 

I have had so many powerful and wonderful conversations with friends and family this week about the healing power of making art.

That has been such a restorative thing for my soul.

I ended this week’s carving with thoughts about how we are all made of stardust,

and that we are part of a much greater cosmos than we can ever imagine, but we need to try to remember to imagine that,

and so much more….

So, I carved another Starbaby (with lovely Chokecherry wood)

as a reminder of our roots in Source energy,

and also as a reminder to myself of a dream that I had more than 35 years ago-

In the dream, the Northern Lights filled the sky, and

thousands of laughing, chortling, squealing with delight, Starbabies

slid and tumbled down to earth, bringing incredible joy and goodness with them.

May they continue to do so!

Here’s to Goodness! ❤

 

 

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January 3, 2021 · 3:27 pm

Spoons carved at the end of December 2020 and beginning of January 2021

I have been happily carving more spoons…

I carved a large crochet hook with an owl on it few years ago.

I never used it as a crochet hook, so have turned it into an Owlie spoon….

I did the same thing with a large ‘Fairy Door’ crochet hook that I carved and then didn’t use:

 

This Cedar Star Sisterspoon  had an ooops-

I was tweaking her face and her head popped off! EEgads!

Luckily, I was able to rescue her 🙂 I just couldn’t throw her into the firewood pile after all the hours I spent lovingly carving her!

She will be wearing her blue sweater as long as she exists 🙂

I love this little Goddess spoon that I carved from a blank that my son made for me from a birch log from a dead tree in their neighbour’s yard.

I love having her in my pocket and carrying her around like a friendly pebble. 

I carved the Forest Gratitude Spoon as a song of thanks to all the trees and all that do for for us, but even more for them for just being perfectly arboreally themselves.

I love the trees….

My son cut me a lovely piece of wood from what he thinks is Manitoba Maple. 

This is what I do to get started with my carving:  I draw on the blank piece of wood and sketch in a way that takes into account the checks and splits in the wood.

This one piece of wood has 2 spoons in it…. The Forest Gratitude Spoon, and another one that I am hard at work on, and will show you later when it’s done.

I also made myself some leather thumb protectors after I skewered my thumb with a very sharp pointy rasp.

Ow.

All in all, a fine week’s carving, with a few spoons that became firewood, and one that didn’t and happiness in the ones that are now prompting me to make a shelf for them…

So much fun.

I hope that you are having lovely times, too. 

Happy New Year ❤

 

 

 

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December 29, 2020 · 4:34 pm

Carving Wooden Spoons is delightful

Oh my goodness! Carving wooden spoons is just wonderful!

Hard work, yes. but…. ohhhh….

I have been a wood carver for decades, but have just discovered the joy of carving spoons.

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!

Be kind, be safe, be well! ❤

Here’s the video:

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