Whittling
 

I like to whittle.

A couple more. Sometimes I paint them too.

Cool, V! How big are they?

What's your wittlin' tool?

Can you whittle?


Ture, itt eaty. Jutt put your lipt together and blow.

very nice!

A few weeks ago, I had trimmed a few small branches off our maple tree. The kids love running around with sticks, and were breaking off the smaller twigs to make good sticks they could play with. So went went inside and got a couple of pocket knives and taught them about cutting the bark off, and cutting off all the little sharp twigs poking out the sides. Making the sticks nice and smooth. Both were instantly hooked. We spent a couple hours, just sitting on the bench of the picnic table, making piles of shavings in the grass by our feet.

Absolutely nothing like this though.

Wow- very cool! I LOVE the knife! Very awesome stuff, V.

Here's the only popular culture whittling reference I know. Enjoy:


Cletus/"I don't know my memory ain't been so good ever since I drank my thermometer, but I whittles every thing I see.Sometimes I even whittles the future"-/Cletus.

Tthanks guys!

I really do love to whittle. These are all neckerchief slides to be worn with our scout uniforms. They're a couple of inches across at most. The first three, the fleur-de-lis, the knife and the boot are all free form carvings from a small piece of wood. The crocodile at the bottom was from a kit. The first ones are carved from brazillian rosewood, which I had left over from the kayak project. It is *amazing* wood, gorgeous grain and color. It takes a knife well, provided the knife is very sharp. The wood is very hard. It is commonly used to make marimbas. It will make a musical ring when struck. Not pieces this small of course.

The little croc at the bottom is a lot easier to carve being basswood. But the flip side is that is also tears more easily and requires much more sanding. Also, the grain is practically invisible--uninteresting, so it begs to be painted. That's ok, the painting's fun too.

This particular one belongs to SonofV, to whom it was awarded last summer for having the biggest smile at summer camp. Appropos.

I have several more, and I will post them soon.

As to my whittling tools, my principal knife is a Winchester Stockman. Here's a picture.

I keep it very sharp and I make very small cuts. I have a set of carving chisels, but for this kind of work, they are unsuitable. If I was able to dog them down onto the bench and work the chisel with two hands, perhaps. I can do practically everything I want to do using a lever cut with the spey blade. Word to the wise: keep it sharp.

your linky wasn't workin - here ya go
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA280_.jpg

yes. damn my self confidence. pressing post before proofing my work. what in the world was I thinking.

i hate the img tag.

oh, and very nice whittlings .... is that a word?

:rolleyes:

I remember how my great-uncle Jerry would sit on the porch and whittle all day long. Once he whittled me a toy boat out of a larger toy boat I had. It was almost as good as the first one, except now it had bumpy whittle marks all over it. And no paint, because he had whittled off the paint.

--Jack Handey

Thanks! Sure. Carvings is a word, I accept your word.

The wooden knife pic looks like Mahogany.

I like ta whittle, too. It a lil tough wid tha gaps in ma teff.