A scoop and a kuksa in progress

Today I finished off a little scoop. It is in hawthorn, as that is the wood I have currently. The scoop was inspired by the work of a member in a spoon-related facebook group I`m a member of. It is a fantastic group to be in because your always inspired with new ideas, styles and techniques. Like this scoop. I have quite a bit to post today, but I`ll let the pictures do the talking for now.

 It is a small scoop, with a bowl-diameter of 6cm and 10 cm overall length.

I went ahead and sanded it. It is the first spoon I have sanded in months and months. I have been working on my tooled finish, and it is coming along well. In this case I wanted a really smooth surface because I wanted to see how the grain would pop out. There were hints of a psychedelic pattern in the grain, and I wasn`t disappointed.

Here are some more pictures. I am trying to work on the quality of those. There is lots of room for improvement there. I had good intentions to take pictures outside today, but the rain was so enthousiastic that I didn`t really dare venture outside.

Now for part two of my post. A kuksa. Two days ago I began working on a kuksa. The largest one I have started this far. I also did a picture sequence on how it progressed, but considering the lenght of this post I`ll save that for when it is finished. Here is a picture from the kuksa in its current state.

 I am considering sanding it, now that I have seen how the scoop turned out. I haven`t quite decided yet. Currently I am letting it dry slowly in a bag filled with wood shavings, hoping it won`t crack. I have removed a fair bit of the inner growth rings to be on the safe side. I think it`ll be fine.