Congratulations to........

Amanda!!! Her suggestion for a basketmaking kit was:

"How about a letter/post basket? We usually end up leaving our post in a pile by the door for people to sort through to find their own. It looks untidy and often gets knocked onto the floor."

Yes, we have the same problem in our house, so I'm going to play around with a few ideas and hopefully design a kit to make a useful and attractive post holding receptacle!!

Many thanks to Amanda and everyone who took the time to enter our competition. A little berry basket full of goodies will be winging it's way to Amanda next week.

Meanwhile, we wish everyone a peaceful, happy and prosperous New Year. Noses back to the grindstone on Tuesday!

Happy holidays everyone!

We hope you all have a wonderful Christmas break and a happy, peaceful and prosperous New Year.

It looks like most of us in the UK will have at least a bit of a picture postcard white Christmas, even us here in deepest, darkest Dorset! So I for one am going to make the most of it and I hope you all will too! I wonder if snow sticks to the beaches..... perhaps a trip to the coast with the camera beckons.....?

We will be in the office until tomorrow lunchtime and then we will re-open on the 4th January 2011, but if you need to leave us a message urgently, our answerphone will be on and we will be checking it from time to time.

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week:

Capricious

Subject to, led by, or indicative of caprice or whim; erratic:

Wisdom of the week:

Weather is a great metaphor for life - sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad, and there's nothing much you can do about it but carry an umbrella. -Terri Guillemets

Sums the week up really!

A Winter Solstice story of snow and woodland

Some more photos taken in the local woods yesterday. For the Winter Solstice, with it's promise of longer days to come and an eclipse of the moon due on Tuesday, I thought this would be the perfect poem

 Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

 

Whose woods these are I think I know,

His house is in the village though.

He will not see me stopping here,

To watch his woods fill up with snow.
 

My little horse must think it queer,

To stop without a farmhouse near,

Between the woods and frozen lake,

The darkest evening of the year.
 

He gives his harness bells a shake,

To ask if there is some mistake.

The only other sound's the sweep,

Of easy wind and downy flake.
 

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep.

A snowy surprise

In thirty years of living in this village, I think we have only seen about thirty days of snow and incredibly four of those have been this year! We were supposed to be visiting members of our family 150 miles away this weekend so awoke at 6.30am all set for the journey only to find that about two inches of snow had fallen during the night. After quick phone calls we all decided that it would be daft to try driving so far in snow and abandoned the idea, which was just as well because two hours later, four inches of fresh snow had fallen along our route and locally several trucks had blocked the main road on a hill, it was too slippery for them.

So we went shopping locally instead, (just in case we get REALLY snowed in) and I went for a lovely walk around the edge of the village with a camera. Here's a view of the old railway track that is now a public footpath.

this is a copse just a little walk from the path

And my favourite, the field where our old dog used to have a good gallop every day.

It's cold, but we really are lucky to live in such a beautiful place.

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week:

Fussbudgety

Very careful, meticulous.

Wisdom of the week:

"Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude" - Zig Ziglar

Hackers - a cautionary tale.

So you do everything that you're told. You've known the internet since 1997, kind of grown up with it, you were lucky enough to learn about computer programming on a binary system at school in the seventies. As a result, you never open any spurious e-mails and you certainly don't click on any links in mail, even when you know for sure where it came from. No, you open a new tab and type in the full address of the website you want and log in there - like any good sensible person would. You never give out your passwords, you change them regularly and you always make sure that they can't be easily guessed, they contain a good mix of upper and lower case letters with a sprinkling of numbers. You don't "do" free wi-fi and you always have up to date virus checkers, spam detectors, anti phishing software, malware scanners and every other device available to mankind to take away the fear of theft via the internet through your computer. And then.............one day you get genuine e-mails fom your very own Paypal account, one congratulating you on opening an international account and a second confirming your transfer of all of your funds to this account. But you know that you haven't logged into your account for three weeks or more and this has all happened when you were asleep at 2am this morning.

Once your heart has settled back comfortably into the left hand portion of your upper chest and you can breathe freely again, you analyse what has happened. You log in through a new tab and take a careful look around your account. Sure enough it's all true. How? How can Paypal have allowed a US land based dollar account to be set up by a UK resident with a sterling account? How was the account accessed in the first place? So you fill out the statutory report forms, print off the details for your own records and wait. Three reports later and still no cases are showing up in your "resolution" folder, then suddenly you get an e-mail that starts:

"During a recent security check, we found that someone tried to access your PayPal account.........."

No mention of any reports filed, but there is apparently one resolved case showing in your "resolution" folder with no details available. The money, (still in dollars) has miraculously reappeared in your account, but it isn't the amount in sterling that you had before, charges have been taken for the exchange rate. The international account has been deleted.

Then it's on the radio. Lots of big name internet sites have been attacked by cyber hackers for their removal of support for Wikileaks, but it's only a Ddos attack so obviously the hackers just want to bring the sites down for a while to prove that they can cause some disruption. Coincidence? Make your own mind up.

We've decided that perhaps claiming 100% security is a red rag to a website hacking bull and maybe the clever people who write the highly complex security programmes also have more than enough intelligence to break into them whenever they like. We never did trust the internet with financial information, this has just confirmed our doubts.

So apologies to everyone if it causes inconvenience, but we have no choice but to remove the Paypal option from our websites for our own sanity. It's just one thing too many to think and worry about.

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week.

Nefarious

Extremely wicked or villainous; iniquitous: a nefarious plot.

Wisdom of the week.

 

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns, as it were, instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink. - George Orwell.

 

All I have to say is "Paypal" the reason for this weeks word and wisdom! All will be revealed.....

Word of the Week. (bit late this week, sorry - blame the snow!)

Serendipitous

 

Come upon or found by accident; fortuitous: serendipitous scientific discoveries.

 

Wisdom of the Week 

 

Look for something, find something else, and realize that what you’ve found is more suited to your needs than what you thought you were looking for. - Lawrence Block

 

I'd like to do that all the time.

Oooooh soooo cold!

No snow yet, the sun is shining and the scenery is wonderful but it is absolutely freezing here, -3 degrees with a biting, spiteful wind. But the good news is that all of our messy building work is complete and we are finally fully installed in our new workshop. What a baptism, the coldest weather for years just as we have finished moving in!

And here is the overall view from the front

The area behind the bookshelves is the "clean" area where we do weaving and finishing, beyond that, through the opening is the original studio which is now our "dirty workshop" where we do any woodwork repairs and colour matching.

This is where the mail order is processed. All very cosy - despite the weather.

So busy.........thank goodness

It might be because we're coming up to Christmas, or perhaps it's just our own fault for trying to do so many things at once, but there never seems to be any spare time at all - not even to put updates here on the blog.

So a quick catch up!

We are currently out of stock of thick paper fibre rush in "Antique" finish. A large consignment will be arriving within two weeks, so unfortunately any orders received cannot be processed until then. Apologies in advance for any problems this may cause. We do however have plenty of thin "Antique" and both thick and thin diameters of "River" paper fibre in stock.

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week

Oxymoron

A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

Wisdom of the Week


A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on. - Samuel Goldwyn

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week.

Sanctimonious

Trying to appear full of holiness or goodness

Wisdom of the Week

Just remember, there's a right way and a wrong way to do everything and the wrong way is to keep trying to make everybody else do it the right way. - M*A*S*H* Colonel Potter.
 

I loved M*A*S*H*!

Basket design prize - hurry, closes in December!

So the prize will be...................

This "hand made by me" Bridesmaids Berry Basket filled with local Dorset goodies and produce!! So help me out please, what kind of basket would you like to be able to make if you could choose? You can either e-mail me at sales@formerglory.co.uk or leave me a comment here on this post or the previous prize post here with your suggestions. Entries accepted from Europe and America/Canada, (because the postage isn't too bad!) but sorry to all in Australia/New Zealand, this package would be a bit too large and expensive to send, but then I can always organise a different prize........So please don't be put off from entering.

Painting!

We seem to have had paintbrushes in our hands for much of the last three weeks. However, it does finally feel like things are moving on. The floor of the studio at the back of the workshop was in a terrible state, look at the difference a lick of paint makes:

It's covering up five years of spills and other work related mess! It was in such a poor state that I was ashamed, but it's starting to look good now, should be finished by tomorrow night.

Meanwhile, I haven't forgotten the basket design competition sorry that it's been a bit delayed......but I do have a cunning plan and will be making an announcement very, very soon.

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week:

Asininity

The quality of being asinine, stupidity combined with stubornness.

Wisdom of the Week:

 

'Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt. - Abraham Lincoln

 

Brilliant advice!

Water, wind and the lack of electricity

Blogging has been out of the question for the last few days. Since Thursday when the new electricity consumer unit was fitted, we have had fun and games! All was well on Friday and Saturday, we actually managed to finish off some proper work - a couple of French chairs with an unusual seat weave, here's one finished and one about to be stripped:

and the rewrapping of a sweet little Liberty's Tudric teapot handle:

Then everything went "pear shaped".

On Sunday we were all set to start work in the workshop - the final push towards moving in properly - when the electricity tripped out! Our electrician tried really hard by phone to help us to sort the problem out, but the new consumer unit was having none of it. He decided he would come around to investigate......

A new problem, we had a neutral earth leak?!! After two hours, the electrician isolated the offending circuit so that at least we had heating and light throughout the house and power to three rooms. But none of us were any the wiser as to what the problem was. Yesterday he came back again and thanks to his many years of experience, he found the problems and thank goodness he did. There were two dangerously wired power points that we didn't even know existed - inside a wardrobe! We have been very lucky, because if at any time these two power sockets had overheated, there would have been a fire.........

Whilst all of this was going on and just to add insult to injury, we discovered a water leak in the new garage roof. A puddle had formed perfectly on the new boarding that we had only fitted on Saturday - right next to some electric wires! Frustrated we called the builder who came to investigate almost immediately. It was as we'd suspected, the freak wind and heavy rain was so intense on Saturday night that it had driven the water up and under the lead roof flashing.....remedial work will be done later this week, assuming it stops raining for long enough!!

We are so lucky to have such good people to look after us.

Back to normal now, so a lot of catching up to do.

Thursday 4th November!!

On Thursday 4th from about 9.15am we will be without electricity!! The electrician is fitting a new consumer unit and he isn't sure at this stage how long it will take, but probably most of the day.

Our phone will be working and we will be in the office taking calls as usual, but please bear with us, processing of orders will be delayed until the power is back on and we can use the computer. Responding to e-mails will also be held up for the same reason.

Sorry about this, but it has to be done and hopefully it will mean that we will have a safe and reliable system forever!

Word & Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week

Procrastination - the counterproductive deferment of actions or tasks to a later time.

Just too busy to do that........

Wisdom of the Week

"Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the Ark. Professionals built the Titanic" - Unattributed.

Well, there's a thought!

Colouring and tinting new cane to look like the old stuff!

There seem to be a few schools of thought when it comes to whether new bright cream cane should be coloured to look old or not. A lot of caners I know just refuse to do it, others are loathe to try because the results can be a bit disappointing, then others feel that the cane should be allowed to age and discolour naturally.

Recently we've had a lot of panels that had to be coloured and I must admit that some of them have been a challenge! Like the modern bench seat below..........almost purple....!

The panels above are new replacements and were bright cream, they have all been tinted to one degree or another.

And this modern French chair seat, opaque cream.

I only ever use powder water based colouring which can then be sealed using oils or shellac to give the final desired colour and I only tint the reverse of the panel if it shows, like on a back. The colour is mixed to match as closely as possible in the pot first before application, then it's "one hit" to get it right.

Fiddly, but sometimes it just has to be done!

Anniversaries and more close cane work!

Two anniversaries this month, 23 years in this house and a few more than that since we got married!!!!

Everyone thought we were mad to choose October for our wedding, but as it turned out, the day started with a lovely misty morning and brightened up to be a beautiful golden Autumnal day - perfect! So our "boys" got us these....

And we just loved the card....

I WANT those kittens!

Meanwhile work continues. Look at this for a rare thing.

It's an Eisteddfod chair, specially made for the Welsh festival of the Arts that has been in existence since the 12th century. This chair was made for the festival in 1884 and proudly bears a brass plaque on the top rail. I have just started to replace the seat - it's going to take a while I think!

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week

Ergomania

An obsessive zeal for or a compulsion to be constantly at work.

Possibly.....

Wisdom of the Week

"By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may get to be the boss and work twelve hours a day" - Robert Frost.

Yay!!!

And now for something completely different.........

Cane panelling.

You see it all over the place, but mostly in chair seats and bedheads. Well, we had an interesting request last week, it went something like this,

"I have a 1966 American Dodge car and it's got some kind of cane panelling on the door and seat backs, if I send you a picture, can you tell me whether you have it?"

We've seen and worked on cars with centre cane seats like the Fiat Jolly......we've even helped out weaving a chair seat for an antique aircraft and endless canoe seats...... we've supplied plastic cane panelling for the boot of a Bentley, the sides of a horse carriage and the cabins of boats...........but the interior of a Dodge?!!!!

Yes, the interior. It's lovely! Look at all that detail, very special. Now my other half wants to know what the outside of the car look like, (motor head!)

The new workspace

Week six of the build and the internal finishing is coming on well. After our marathon sanding session at the weekend the plasterboard is ready to paint.

Suddenly the space looks bigger. We need to move in desperately.........look at what once was our dining room.....

This is virtually all restoration work waiting to be done, there's nowhere else to store anything!

Word and Wisdom of the Week

This weeks word:

Satiated

1. to fill or supply beyond capacity or desire, often arousing weariness

2. to supply to satisfaction or capacity
This weeks wisdom:

"There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full" - Henry Kissinger

 I'm with him on that one!

Chairs to mend!! The Old Cry of London

Lovely Leanne my blogging friend sent this great bit of text to me about the old chair menders of London, I wanted to share it with you.

"CHAIRS TO MEND!" By Alexander Wainwright

The art of doing small things well has a good illustration in the humble chair-mender of the London streets, who is also one of the most interesting of out-door tradesmen.

He carries all his implements and materials with him. A very much worn chair is thrown over one arm as an advertisement of his occupation, and it is needed, for his cry, "Cha–ir–s to men–n–nd," is uttered in a melancholy and indistinct, though penetrating, tone. Under the other arm he usually has a bundle of cane, split into narrow ribbons. -

Taken from St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, October 1878, No. 12

In Georgian England the "Cries of London" were part of the atmosphere of the City and how the buying public located the services or products that they needed. Nel Gwynne for example was well known as the "darling" of orange sellers and each trade or supplier had their own distinctive cry and regular street routes or "rounds". There is a fascinating article here about Georgian street trade.

What a lovely thought that in some ways we uphold such an old trade, but instead of plying the streets carrying a chair, we can use photographs on the the communication highway - the internet - and blogging is our equivalent of the cry "Cha–ir–s to men–n–nd"!

The builders have finished!

The day has arrived...........the builders have gone and the shell of the building is finished. Now OUR hard work begins. We made the obligatory trip to B&Q yesterday to buy paint, loft ladders, wood etc. finally getting back to base at about 2pm. Then we began the massive job of sanding the walls and ceiling where filler has been used to cover the plasterboard seams and screw holes. Oh wow, after just one hour we looked like snowmen and even after three hours of hard labour, we'd only managed to sand the walls and half of the ceiling! So guess what we'll be doing all day today.........

Meanwhile, a mystery in the garden.

What is this bird? It's never visited the garden before and when it did yesterday, all of the other birds flew around it and chased it off. It reappeared this morning to have another bath in the rockery.

The green woodpecker came back too.

So pretty!

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week:

Obstreperous

Resisting control or restraint in a difficult manner; unruly, noisy, clamorous, or boisterous: obstreperous children.

 

Great word, I'll use it more often.

Wisdom of the week:

"All I ask is the chance to prove that money can't make me happy" - Spike Milligan

"Are you going to come quietly, or do I have to use earplugs?" - Spike Milligan

Okay two for the price of one this week, but that's what you always got from Spike!

Autumn has arrived and we nearly have the new workshop

So another week has passed, Autumn is officially upon us and what have we done? Well, the workshop is nearly finished I'm pleased to say and we are very, very happy with it! The Father and son team of builders have worked their socks off in good weather and bad - they have been a delight.

So, now we can't wait to start moving in.........

Look at the great roof lights and storage space!

The ceiling goes in this week along with the new doors. Then we can start the painting process and working out exactly how we can make best use of this new space.

Meanwhile we have finished quite a few "bits". The final colouring of the cane in the five medallion backed dining chairs.....

And the re-rushing of the seat in the "one chair from two", (see the original pair of chairs here)

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week:

Punctilious

extremely attentive to punctilios; strict or exact in the observance of the formalities or amenities of conduct or actions.

Wisdom of the Week:

Nancy Astor: “Sir, if you were my husband, I would give you poison.”
Sir Winston Churchill: “If I were your husband I would take it.”

Hehe.

Create! Episode two...

So......, further around the courtyard. I just loved these:

The stunning wire sculpture of the highly talented Helen Godfrey. Here she is with her chickens:

Just gorgeous! Then something else equally lovely this Green Man water spout:

Hand carved in stone by Annie Jeffery:

Then the wonderful jewellery makers, Min Fletcher-Jones, you can see her work here:

and Liz Guilmant-Cush who was holding a very interesting workshop for glass beadmaking.

Some immensely talented people there who were so free with their time and encouragement to the visitors. It all added up to an inspiring weekend, despite the horrible weather.

Create! At Walford Mill Craft Centre

This post is going to be long........you have been warned! I will split it up in smaller bite sizes - here is "episode one".....

To set the scene:

Walford Mill is a complex of lovely old brick buildings set next to the river Allen on the edge of the beautiful town centre of Wimborne with it's 1300 year old Minster and Georgian houses. The mill buildings have been converted into a craft gallery, workshops and bistro cafe arranged around a central courtyard. The old mill leet meanders past the courtyard to the Allen river which is quite shallow and crystal clear as it passes the complex and flows on under an adjacent ancient bridge. The staff who run the Mill are a delight, so friendly and helpful, they organise some amazing exhibitions and events - I had a very enlightening guided tour of their current exhibition of Lois Walpole's recycled basketry works - Fab! Such inspiring work enthusiastically described and beautifully displayed. The Create event has been held annually for the past few years. Local makers are invited to give a demonstration of their skills during the weekend while musicians perform for the visitors.

Saturday was a surprisingly sunny and warm Autumn day considering that it had rained so much on Friday, we were nearly flooded out at home! We arrived early and set up our gazebo under the trees next to the courtyard. Alongside us was Bill Crumbleholme with his Raku pottery kiln, Abbott Street Forge and Peter Moors making greenwood chairs. Further around the yard were Helen Godfrey wire sculptress, Min Fletcher-Jones jewellery maker, Annie Jeffery stone sculptress and Tiggy Rawling with her textile art.

First a little about Bill's Raku pots. He made four firings on Saturday which were met with gasps from the gathered audience. And here's why:

Red hot pots!

Slowly cooling down and showing their glaze colours. From here the pots are put into sawdust in flame proof containers, the sawdust immediately catches fire and removes any oxygen from the glaze. When the flames die down, the pots are removed and cleaned.

The finished article, every one unique and beautiful. Raku is a fascinating process.

Then next was Peter Moors with his green woodworking. He makes all sorts of outdoor furniture, hurdles, turns bowls and whittles some lovely tactile pendants. Here he is working on one of his creations.

Abbott Street Forge work in iron, anything from railings to the most intricate dragons! Look at this character, he's amazing.

They fired up a portable forge and gave demonstrations on Saturday, but sadly it rained too heavily on Sunday to risk lighting it.

More to follow.........

Announcing the basket design inspiration prize!!

We're working on creating DIY kits for baskets, so would love to hear your ideas of just what type of basket you would like to see. Would you want practical or decorative, modern or traditional, coloured or natural, textured or smooth, tiny or HUGE........................Whatever! Here's some I made earlier.

Just e-mail me or comment here on the blog with your suggestions and ideas. There will be prizes for the most inspirational suggestions, some Dorset goodies....................

Why not become a follower to keep track of progress

The frog and toad!

We were minding our own business last night walking home through the village when my other half said "Look there, in the road - it's a frog!" Sure enough there was a small frog trying to cross the road. Now I'm stupid about things like this so I just had to pick up the frog and take him to safety before he got squished.

So, we continue our stroll homeward, I'm carrying the frog at arms length just in case he decides to....well, pee or something.... when other half says, "There's another one!" And there just squatting, right in the middle of the car tyre tracks, is a big fat toad. Well what could I do? So I risk life and limb, rush into the road and pick up the toad with my other hand. Now I'm walking home with both arms outstretched like a character from "Return of the Mummy".

We finally get home and I get my other half to take a pic:

Aren't they lovely?

I released them next to the pond in the garden. Frog spawn next year maybe?

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the Week:

Sedulous

diligent in application or attention; persevering; assiduous, persistently or carefully maintained: sedulous flattery.

Hmmm.........


Wisdom of the Week:

"Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm." - Sir Winston Churchill.

No, cant honestly say I'd have the patience to do that.

Another weekend.

It's Monday and yet again we haven't stopped.

Last weekend was a marathon, on Saturday morning we travelled the 100 or so miles to mother in laws house. The property needs to go on the market soon and there is still a lot of organising to do. We picked up paperwork, cleaned furiously for two hours, checked in with the neighbours, then following a swift change of clothes, we left to go to my best friend's marriage blessing ceremony at 3pm a further 40 miles north. I think we must have hit every traffic jam in the World and as a result arrived 15 minutes late. It was lovely to see everyone again, but was all too brief - we had to leave at 5pm to get home at a reasonable time. Meanwhile in our absence, work continued on the new garage/workshop.

This Saturday was a repeat journey north, this time to meet with all of the family members at the house to do as much sorting out as we could. There were seven of us, but it still took about 6 hours to make any impact on the house clearance. We were home by 8pm. Sunday was catch up time for shopping - we hardly had any food in the house! Needless to say we both slept very well last night.

We are still working despite the chaos!

Well I realised that I haven't updated the work in progress for ages now, (too carried away with the excitement of the construction). So this last two weeks, what else have we been doing? There is a complete rebuild of one chair from two. Luckily one chair had broken seat rails but the rest of the frame is in reasonable, retrievable condition, whilst the other had a completely broken frame but perfect seat rails.

The "one chair from two" is now waiting for the glue to set so that we can put a new seat on tomorrow.

The porch rocker was also finished last week and will go home tomorrow:

We have also finished three rush ladderback chairs, a couple of cane panels and joy of joys, a set of five medallion backed dining chairs. Apart from that we've had two deliveries of materials but had no space for them in the store, so guess where the four foot high by three foot pile is currently lurking - in the breakfast room!! Roll on getting a new workshop.

Half way there....

We've nearly got a workshop...........The blockwork is almost up to roof height now and we are really beginning to see just how it will look when it's finished.

It is going to be a great place to work, there will be two roof windows and as the whole space faces South West, it should have good light all day long.

Word and Wisdom of the Week

Word of the week:

Bellicose

Inclined or eager to fight; aggressively hostile; belligerent; pugnacious.

Hopefully not something I'm guilty of - I'm a pussycat!

Wisdom of the week:

"Patriots always talk of dying for their country, never of killing for their country" - Bertrand Russel

 Never thought of it like that before.

Progress

Things have moved on apace! The local builder and his son have been here this week working furiously, it's been great to see a new workshop rising phoenix like from the rubble and mess. This was the site on Tuesday:

Just before the concrete was poured into the holes for the foundations.

By Thursday the foundations were in:

 

 

 

The conrete slab floor goes down today, woo hoo! Now we've been told we need to find two new front doors that we like.