Green-wood carving classes, spring, 2015. Carving green wood is much easier than carving dry wood, and in the days when most people didn't have woodshops with power tools, vises, clamps, and hold-downs of all varieties, carving green wood was something you did in your lap while you were sitting around of an evening. So that's pretty much what a spoon-carving class is all about. I've been teaching it mostly at primitive skills gatherings (this year I'll be at Buckeye, and maybe Echoes in Time), but this year friends Charlene and Richard Murdock white invited me to teach at their wonderful . . .
Cabin Stove/Sidewinder Build Sequence
This photo-essay documents about 2 days of experimentation that resulted in a pretty stupendous new variation on Max's "Cabin Stove." The overall footprint of the stove determined the firebox size, and the geometry resulted in a rectangular heat riser that took hot gasses from a vertical throat in the corner of the firebox -- unconventional, but it worked amazingly well. More to come! (Ed. Note: This stove, like so many others, is merely one more in a long line of innovations and adaptations, all based on the same basic principles: burn the fuel fast, hot, & clean, and extract and store as . . .
Earth Oven builders in Ecuador (Manuel (10), Juan Carlos (6))
A builder in Alaska sent me this story about an earth oven she built in Ecuador, with two helpers. At the ages of 10 and 6, they are clearly competent. Margaret writes: Winters in Kodiak were beginning to get to me. I had it in mind to snow goose it away in a warmer climate for the coldest, darkest part of winter. Alan and his girlfriend, Loretta were due to get married on their farm [in Ecuador]. They invited me to the wedding. And so I went. I had always said to Allan that if I did ever get to Ecuador then I would build them an oven. What a fine wedding present that would be ...... The . . .