Also now we are up and running on You Tube and Ko-Fi along with our online shops time at the computer tends to be spread over all these platforms.
However we really want to keep this blog going for the projects and activities we would like to share with you all in more depth, whether it be on weaving, spinning and dyeing or wood turning, garden and home renovation. There really is plenty to talk about and get stuck into next year.
Meanwhile we just want say All Good Wishes for the Festive Season and Peace, Health and Happiness for the New Year.
Thank you for reading our little blog, watching our YouTube, supporting us on ko-fi and purchasing our work. It really inspires us to create, develop and keep our "Woollen Tree" growing
The photo above is of a beautiful old Oak Tree in the field on our way to the woods opposite Hillside Cottage. It offers strength, wisdom, stability and endurance in the storms.
I say hello and hug it as I pass by, I love to be near it and look up into its mighty canopy.
So we near the end of September, our first year at our lovely Hillside Cottage. We have been enjoying a bumper harvest from our garden, despite the "heatwave summer" the UK has been experiencing, we really have had an abundance of fruit and vegetables to keep us well stocked. I have been making jams and chutneys.
The joy of walking down to the veg garden to select something for our lunch has been immense. We are fortunate to have a variety of fruits- cherries, apples, plums, damsons, raspberries, blue berries, black currants and blackberries. all giving us their treasure each in turn. We have been growing all our veg and salad crops. As we take care of our garden it takes care of us. Organically, no-dig, permaculture system.
The result is tasty food, lots of flowers, insects, bees, butterflies, birds and wildlife. The only battle we seem to be having is with all the wild rabbits! they, given a chance nibble everything- even things they are not suppose to like! luckily our vegetable beds are well fenced so as they can't get in but the terrace up near the cottage and the flower pots are all easy pickings. The baby rabbits are so sweet though hopping around the clover on our lawn. Next year we will build a few more fences to protect our specimen plants on the terrace.
We also attended a lovely craft fair at the nearby village of Orleton. It's great to showcase our work and sell locally.
It's been a very busy year at Hillside Cottage, so much so that our blog here hasn't been able to keep up with all we would like to share with you.
Please remember that our Woollen Tree on You Tube is available for you to view along with our
Ko-Fi site where we plan to chat more and open a little shop on the site too. Thank you for your support.
We are looking forward to producing more work in our Woollen Tree workshops/studio once all the harvest is "safely gathered in"
Meanwhile check our Etsy and Folksy shops to purchase new stock for the new Season.
With my recent upgrade to a Record Power Coronet Envoy Lathe
I have been reorganising my “workshop” to try and make it more efficient. I say
workshop, but it is really my garage, and things are arranged such that work
surfaces collapse and the bandsaw and other equipment all slot away to allow
the car to fit back in the garage when needed (although since retirement, the
tendency is to leave the workshop set up for woodturning more often than not!).
One of pieces of equipment I have never been comfortable
with is my dust collection system; its not the actual equipment (Record Power
Cam Vac), but how to arrange/ secure the 100mm dia flexible hose. Because this new
lathe has a swivel head I need to be able to adjust the position of the hose to
best suit where the work is.
I had previously made a Heath-Robinson stand to support the
hose, but it was never very stable and was more trouble than it was worth.
So I started looking at proprietary equipment that wasn’t
too expensive and offered the flexibility I was after.
There are lots of angle poise type stands and other flexible
stands on the market designed to hold smart phones or tablets etc, and I was
tempted by some of these; but I was worried these would not be robust enough to
support hose (its reasonably heavy, and the construction makes it act like an
extended spring).
So I opted for an articulated bracket designed for a
portable TV, which I was sure I could adapt to suit the hose.
Here is the TV bracket kit and it partially assembled.
I now had to devise a way to mount the bracket while giving
me as wide a range of coverage as I could get. The Record Power Coronet Envoy
has a built-in shelf under the lathe bed that I had hoped to make use of, but
unfortunately it wasn’t the right height. But a couple of bits of timber
screwed to the wall and an adjacent shelf worked out fine.
Then to attach the hose to the bracketry I bolted the plate
designed to mount the TV directly to the dust collection hood, this could then
be slotted on to the articulated bracket:
Now the articulated arms of the bracket together with the
ability to tilt the angle of the hood, and the up & down adjustments of the
whole arm means I can now position the hose to suit the majority of my turning
positions.
And it has provided a suitable place for me to mount my
magnetic lamp.
Unfortunately, the arm is not long enough to position the
hose when I have the lathe head fully rotated through 90 degrees; but it is
simple enough to unclip the hose and hood from the bracketry, which then allows
me to route the hose across the lathe bed and support it on the redundant banjo/
tool rest.
So all in all a satisfactory result
Now I just need to go and make something else on the lathe!
We have so many ideas and plans for this new venture.
Please click the Subscribe/like/comment buttons on the site to increase our presence there and help our little Woollen Tree to grow. thank you.
It will be good to share our skills, experience and passion for our work and I hope you will enjoy tuning in and discovering more of what we do in weaving, spinning, dyeing, knitting and wood turnery.
Of course it is a whole new learning curve for us in photography and film making! luckily we have two sons who know a lot more about tech than us, so we will be seeking their help as much as we can.
There will be more videos there just as soon as we have them ready Enjoy!
