Some pictures

My brother is a great photographer, and he has been so kind to take a few picture of me and some of my axes. Here is an excerpt of that collection. All self-explanatory really. :-)

 The woodshed at my uncles place where I sat down to work.

Me at work on the handle.

My beautiful, trusty hatchet.

And now both my beautiful trusted hatchets.

The handle turned out ok, be it a bit thick. I might thin it down a lot, and change the grind on the bit, but for now I`ll leave it as is and see it as my old camping-hatchet. Primarily used for splitting stuff.

An old friend and applewood.

Last weekend I did something that I should have done earlier. I brought my very first hatchet back to life. I bought this axe nearly 10 years ago now. It had been witout a handle for some time, but now it is back in business. I made a handle for it from an oaken branch that has been cut over a year ago, but was stored outside and off the ground. It was not as dry as I hoped for, but I think it will hold up. If it shrinks enough to come loose I`ll simply cut a larger wedge and try again. Today I used it to carve two spoons from fresh apple wood. I found out that the grind is far from perfect for carving. I might fix this some day, but for now I think I`ll just keep it as my camping-hatchet. After all, that is why I bought it all those years ago.

I made a large cooking spoon and a teaspoon. Both need more work but I`ll do that in a few days time, when the wood has dried a bit. It is very fibrous and tears out easily. The large spoon will be a present for my uncle, who left the wood for me to carve instead of burning it.

Racking the plumwine

Last weekend I reckoned it was time to rack the plumwine. The fermentation has stopped. The water in the waterlock has been level for a bit more than a week, and there was layer of sediment at the bottom of the flask. I assume that now the fermenting has come to an end the next objective is to clear the wine, and that all we can do to achieve is wait and rack the wine into a clean container every few months. So, here is what I did:

Carefully, not disturbing the sediment, place the demijohn on a high surface. Have another sterile container ready to rack the wine into. I used one of my food-grade buckets. Take a tube, hang one end in the wine, and suck the wine through untill it starts flowing. I love this principle of transporting fluids. When the wine flows it is a matter of waiting. With the last bit you have to be careful to not suck up the sediment. Tilt the demijohn to get as much wine as you can.

 When all the wine is out, clean the demijohn, pour the wine back in, put the waterlock back on and wait again for a month or two.

I got to taste a sip of the wine when I sucked it through the tube, and was very pleasantly surprised. It is mildly sweet and the plum-taste is very nice. I can`t wait for this stuff to be done so I can enjoy a glass.

Hawthorn kuksa #2.

I enjoy carving kuksa-style cups. They take more effort than spoons, but the outcome is satisfying. This far I have carved four, but the latest one is maybe the first one that approaches the right size.

Compared to the kuksas I did earlier I think I am slowly improving. In the next picture you see my first, third and latest. The second I have given away to a fellow student at school. I hope I`ll find some more wood in the right sizes soon, because this hawthorn is slowly becomming a bit rough on the edges. Also, I do not have much left that is suitable for carving.

The brew goes on.

The demijohns have been blurping away nicely the past weeks, and now they have calmed down a bit. Over the first weeks they bubbled constantly, and you could see the liquid in the flasks buzzing and swirling. Now the plumwine seems to have come to a stop, while the elderberry port bubbles on very slowly. It is interesting to see how the colours of the brews have changed over time. My pictures are a poor approach of reality and do not quite show this, but especially the plum wine has changed colour from a dark purple to a nice orange. It`ll continue to become lighter as it clears over time I assume. I am not entirely certain on how to proceed with the wine, because I thought the fermenting would not stop this quick. I suppose I`ll rack it, clean the flask and put it back in there for some weeks. Then I`ll rack and bottle. For the port I`ll just wait a week or two after it stopped bubbling and then I`ll rack and bottle.