unfinished bottle stoppers,,

just some of my bottle stoppers,,lol have to paint them yet 

nothing to do with carving ,,, but ...

hi folks, here is something i wrote on facebook,, i know some of you dont use fb,, so i will post it here as well, i still carving up a santa storm,, lol and christmas pickles,, and enjoying it not much in the way of videos for the moment but will plan to do a few projects again soon,, take care, and keep carving ,  arleen

hi folks,,  this has nothing to do with woodcarving but felt some might find this interesting,,  many of you along with myself belong to a local churches,,  as many of you might find as i did this week, sometimes we do not agree with some of the changes taking place,, when ever you get a group of folks together, whether its a carving club, job , church or any gathering of folks your bound to have some disagreements,,  one thing i do not like , is change,, but in life change is bound to happen at some point  and places of worship are no different,, as much as we like to have harmony sometimes there is not,, we are people ,, with feeling and strong opinions of what should be done,,  i have gone to the same church for the past 35 years, and believe me i seen many changes,, some i like some i did not like,, it never kept me from going ,, i may not be as involved as i should or could have been, but my faith did not rest on a church,, its just a place gather that are like minded,, but with a lot of changes i  often would not respond or get the information i needed to see why things happen the way they did,,,  well this past week,   i wanted to finally email a staffer at the church,, wanting only to convey my concerns and wanted some answers ,, their reply was come in and let chat,,,, i been the kind of person that if i didn't like it i just didn't say anything,,  and let things ride,,,  in the 35 years i may have contacted them 3 times ,, so i am not a complainer  to them,, to my friends yes lol ... but this time i decide to step out of my comfort zone,, and go meet with them,,   yes its something i didnt want to do,,,  but if i truly looking for answers then i need to be willing to listen to them,,,  after about 40 mins,,  i came away different,, 

no we didn't agree on all four issues i was concern about,, but two of the issues were explained well enough that i was ok with it ,, but what about the last two,, well,, ok i did my part and stated my concern,, and thought that the one was big enough issue that maybe i should go to another church,,  and there lies the problem,, i  am not a church hopper,,  some folks can do it in a blink of an eye,, its a very personal decision and for me , i decided to stay,, cause in reality every organized meeting whether its church or other club,, they all have something that your not going to like,, but i do believe their are times that its best to move on,, and one thing i came away from this week,, i no longer feel the frustration,,  but free,  i went and met with them,, we chatted, it was fine,  and i notice time is to short on this earth to be consume with frustrations that really is much of our own doing,,  keep the faith people,,  

new santas the spiral shorty santa

when you have to wait it's a great time to carve

hi folks, again its been a while,, soooo busy here at the farm,,  and just took this picture as i took my folks to an appointment,, and this is what i do,, i often will sit in the carve and carve,  the cigar box was my grandfathers from many years ago ,,, i use it for my tools but its great also to catch the woodchips that i create,,  so when you have to wait,, put together a small bag or box,, just a couple of knives and then your ready to carve in the car... you be amazed how much carving you can get done just doing this,, so if your driving folks to places and you have to wait then carve,,  it makes the time fly,,,  i always enjoyed doing this,,,  take care folks and keep carving,, arleen ps this is my shorty santa series ,, lol will have a class coming soon on this one,,