Journal

A friend and I did more work building my spoon mule. I’m fortunate to have access to a pretty nice woodshop, but being surrounded by industrial power tools is a reminder of how much I appreciate the calm quiet of hand tools. Between the band saw and table saw, I feel like I’ve used up every brain cell. Sadly, it made me realize how often I am on autopilot in my daily tasks. I love the quiet contemplation and reflection I feel when I am spoon carving, but nothing (at least for me) demands mindfulness more immediately than power tools with sharp blades.

A fantastic new book, Forge & Carve, just arrived in the mail. It’s a beautiful exploration of traditional crafts published by Canopy Press with a forward by Robin Wood and features many craftspeople that I respect and many more fascinating and skilled folks who I wasn’t aware of. After a quick read, I feel deeply inspired by the experiences and thoughts shared by everyone. I also read The Soul of a Tree by George Nakashima last night. I love his work and words.

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I finished a big two-hander beedle mallet. One of the things that I love of green woodworking is the opportunity to make your tools from resources that are readily at hand.

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I received a beautiful gift in the mail. Greg Nelson sent me a spoon he made from some cherry wood I shared at the Driftless Spoon Gathering in September. I certainly didn’t expect anything in exchange for the wood. The summer storms gave me a treasure trove of wood to carve. A surplus so I felt it was only right to share some of it, but Greg sent this spoon my way, and I’m so grateful for it and the kind letter he included with it. In the short spell I’ve spent carving I’ve had the opportunity to meet so many good people in person and online. Craft teaches humility through the slow acquisition of skill, but so do people. I am humbled to keep company with so many people who inspire and motivate me on this journey of craft and life. Many thanks, Greg!

Later, my friend David and I hit the woodshop to work on my spoon mule. Dawson Moore’s plans are so detailed. If you want a mule, this the way to go. All the parts are now cut, so next week, I’ll glue the head and riser. After, it will be ready to assemble.

I’ve been thinking about the kolrosing class that I took a month or so ago at the American Swedish Institute. It was taught by @rivchicawarrior, and apart from an excellent introduction to the technique, the thing that has been lingering in my thoughts from Liesl’s instruction is being more mindful of taking breaks while practicing our craft. Stretching periodically. Looking off in the distance to give our eyes a break.
Back in the day, I worked an anvil without ear protection and cast or soldered all sorts of metal without a respirator. My ears, lungs, and brain cells are all fucked to some degree because of it.

It’s always challenging to pull away from the bliss of being lost in the moment of our making craft, but I really appreciated Liesl’s reminder to stop and take a break. Take a rest, so we’re restored to continue.
I read a beautiful essay in Mortise and Tenon magazine’s – Tools for Learning: Woodworking with Young Children by Joshua A. Klein and Michael Updegraff. Something every parent and educator should read! In a world of STEM education, it has never been more apparent that what we really need is sloyd (slöjd ) #education. #teachers, please put down the chalk and cursor, and pick up the chisel! My own little guy has been reluctant with woodworking, and that’s okay because he loves making things on his own terms. Like reading, craft will come whenever he’s ready for it.

I interviewed André Souligny and loved this quote by him:

“My mind is quite empty of “thought” when I’m making a spoon …it’s really a wordless harmony between the brain that controls my hands, the tool, my eyes, sound, the wood changing with every chop/slice. There is direction happening, but not like “I’m going to do this, then this, then this…” I see and do, and there is a little bit of “Ah, I see what this will become now.” There is both an overall idea of what you are making as well as some mystery until you get to a certain point, especially if an unexpected knot turns up, then you must make decisions instead of letting it flow.”

I received an early birthday present from my family. An adze made by Svante Djarv. Simply absolutely completely wonderful!!

I went camping at Frontenac State Park. Well, what I did learn in my impending birthday driven campfire contemplations is that as life grows shorter, I need to create twice as hard. Live and love life even harder!

I received a beautiful thing in the mail. Three spoon carving knives arrived. I bought them a few weeks ago from Ben and Lois Orford. Everything about their package radiated handcraftedness (if that is a word) and thoughtfulness. This is what it’s all about – the commerce of beautifully crafted goods and the connections made between maker and user. I hope that my spoons can do justice to the fantastic blades that Ben made.

September | November

August was a busy month. I had to get the freezer ready for a hog later this fall, so that meant emptying lots of birch wood billets. One weekend, early in the month, I went into full production mode (or at least my limited understanding of what spoon production might be like). It felt great to shape out so many spoons and spreaders in a day. It felt like progress.

Then I spent the evening and next day carving them. I’m trying to be more mindful of how the knife cuts and creating even lines as I cut away the wood. It’s a slow go, but the carving is getting cleaner.

It was also my wedding anniversary this month, so like last year, I made my wife another spoon to honor her patience with me and my many distractions like carving. It is a joy though to see someone you love using the spoons you make for them.

I also attended a kolrosing class at the American Swedish Institute. It was taught the amazing kolroser / carver / teacher Liesel (@rivchicawarrior on Instagram). I hope that I have an opportunity to learn from her again! At the same event, I also met Fred Livesay (@hand2mouthcrafts on Instagram). It was an honor to talk with him because I just saw the spoon carving exhibit the he curated at Vesterheim in July.

We went to the farm to scout apples in the orchard for cider production this fall. I was chased by a bull, but even more exciting was discovering a lot of black cherry trees on the land. The smell of the wood as you carve it is wonderful! It coincided with me reading several books on observing nature by Tristan Gooley. It’s funny what you notice once you start paying attention.

I thought I had all of the spoon carving books by I found a new one this month – Carve!: A Book on Wood, Knives and Axes by Hannes Dahlrot and Henrik Francke – and really enjoyed it.

I polished up all of my carvings and prepared them for the Driftless Spoon Gathering. I wish I had more spoons, but I’m looking forward to meeting other carvers and sharing what I’ve made with them.

I got all poetic one night this month while carving chop sticks. Maybe it was the whiskey…

There is something though naturally poetic about spoon carving. The simplicity, the silence, the falling away of everything else in the world.

Charles Bukowski has a poem about creating the perfect place to write in, and how in the end, it’s a bunch of bullshit. If you’re going to write you’re going to do it no matter what. This is where I carve. Just me and the crickets with a little Charlie Parr, Neil Young, and John Prine thrown in the mix. A kind stranger, who I met while picking blueberries in Wisconsin last summer, gave me the stump after I mentioned I was looking for one. The chair belonged to Granny Bea who lived for 98 years in a place that I long for. Thinking of Bukowski, the poem applies to carving too. I’d love a great shop with windows, a spoon mule, those near impossible to purchase knives by Reid Schwartz, and so much more.

But in the end, this chair, stump, and a Mora knife are enough. More than enough.

Late night, late summer sloyd – the cicadas are asleep, as I should be too. Seduced by cricketsong, I step outside of the “woodshop” to look up at the stars so far above the city lights.

A moment to recognize my insignificance in the grand scheme of it all. The thing I so love about craft is the opportunity to be immersed in the moment and the potential to make something that someone might find useful, and perhaps beautiful, long after I am gone.

It’s been a good summer, hope it was for you too.

I began July with a camping trip to Beaver Creek State Park in Southeastern Minnesota. One of the things that I love about spoon carving is that it has to be the most portable form of woodworking. I can take my craft camping and on other trips because the kit required is so minimal.

We traveled to Decorah, Iowa to visit friends. I found some walnut in their brush pile. It’s beautiful wood and I quickly carved 12 spreaders over a weekend. The trip to Decorah also let me check out an absolutely amazing spoon carving exhibit at Vesterheim.

I also finished an interviews with Emmet Van Driesche and David White. I really respect the work of both of these guys, so it was an honor to an interview and get their thoughts on spoon carving and so much more.

Last thing, it was a busy month outside of carving. Between bottling a big batch of rhubarb wine and infusing black currant vodka, I worked hard to capture a bit of summer for the cold winter months ahead.

East of me, west of me, full summer.
How deeper than elsewhere the dusk is in your own yard.
Birds fly back and forth across the lawn
looking for home
As night drifts up like a little boat.

from “After Reading Tu Fu, I Go Outside to the Dwarf Orchard” by Charles Wright

Summer, sweet summer has arrived. Warm afternoons quenched with rhubarb-infused vodka happy hours. Still warm night, long after dusk, dodging mosquitoes as I carve in my garage with the door open. Humidity crawling everywhere like sweating ants and molding my birch wood waiting to be carved in the blink of an eye.

Looking at the wood, I long for the coolness of winter, but I really don’t. I love summer.

I chop billets and transform the birch logs into rough shaped spoons and spreaders day and night like a sweaty madman on a mission that I’m sure none of my neighbors, or family, really understand. I must save the wood, rough it out, and get it into the freezer. And I do. I save most of it, and the rest I’ll dry out for campfires in the days ahead.

My eyes have taken a turn for the worse and it’s getting harder to see close-up. A big handicap when it comes to carving things in detail with a sharp blade. I’m starting to feel my age, and at times, wish my body was give me a little slack every now and then. I wish I had discovered this craft a couple of decades ago when my eyes were good.

And so I accidentally cut myself. I blame my eyes, but more often than not, it’s my attention. In the end, there’s nothing like the nowness of now, yet we forget it and get distracted. That’s what I love about carving, it encourages me to be more present most of the time. And when I’m not, the blood flows. I post a bloody injury on Instagram, and it reinforces the idea that if “it bleeds, it leads” and I get a bunch of “likes” as I apply bandages to my hand. What a fucking weird world we live in!

I went to the farm later in the month and stopped by the Norskedalen Midsummerfest. It’s a wonderful event and I love going there. I hope someday that my carving becomes good enough so I can do demos there. I saw some great woodturning there too.

April was a crazy month. I was pulled away from carving by an unexpected work project and it was pretty amazing how empty I felt without it in my life. Carving grounds me in the same way that I expect that meditation does for other people. I can’t sit and meditate, but I can drop away the rest of the world when I have some wood and a blade in my hands.

I went all arty this month and made a “sculptural” spoon. AKA the shoehorn spoon as someone on Instagram dubbed it. It’s funny because I think all spoons are sculptural, but I guess I pushed the boundaries a bit with this one.

It was liberating though to be free with the form and not be focused primarily on function.

To balance things out though, I made a new jam-making spoon from a pear branch pruned at the farm. We put it to work immediately with multiple batches of rhubarb preserves.