Post #293732 by Tamapoutini on Thu, Mar 22, 2007 2:06 AM

Ahhh, play day...

LLT: Would you believe I have the theme tune from 'Chariots of Fire' running on an endless loop in my workshop, just to keep me pushing for glory? Hope not, coz it's not true! (actually its 'The Eye of The Tiger') :lol:

Benz: Im pretty protective of the '80'. I know Gman has been wanting to have a peek for some time :wink: Its just that it is a 'womb' of sorts and needs privacy & time; not for casual browsing. Im sure you understand.

Tipua: The inclination is the easy part; it would be fair to say I am pretty well obsessed with Pounamu & all things Tiki so the inspiration/energy/focus, etc are kind of with me all of the time. Finding enough time is the hard bit; there just aint enough hours in the day to satisfy those carving-cravings and still maintain a healthy family & social life! Working at it fulltime does leave me a bit jaded (pun intended) from time to time & occasionally I find that I just cant carve, but thats the beauty of being self-employed; on those days we pack up a picnic and head off for an unscheduled family day or whatever... Believe it or not I consider myself a very lazy person too but that might just be a happy side-effect of enjoying my work so much. (especially on play-day)... :wink:

The postman bought me two packages yesterday; both containing stone and both from the US. Neither contained jade. spooky...

The first was from an e:friend & TC lurker (lets call him Tiki-E) and was a couple of examples of his own stonework. Both are carved from beautiful specimens of botroidal (bubbly) 'Fire-Agate'. One is a belly-button 'plug' (fits perfectly but I wont take you there) and the other is a free carved Tiki/Moai-type head. The mouth & closed eye are natural features of the stone. Apparently the layer of 'fire' is quite thin and there is really only one shot at carving it right; go too far & the fire goes out...

Clever eh? I think this guy will have to take his place in another ring -next to the 'Worlds Smallest...' A job for another play-day.

Thanks again Tiki-E!

The next stone to arrive was a bit bigger and lot different'er than anything Ive ever seen before. This one was dug up, thawed out and sent to me by our very own JohnnyP, thanks brother!

(standard Air New Zealand hei-tiki shown for size reference: 2 5/8" or 68mm long)

It is fossilised coral-reef, known as Petoskey stone and apparently displays a honey-comb type pattern when ground into smooth shape. (the official stone of Michigan State you know?) I think Ill put a couple of careful cuts through it on the sawbench to see how the grain/pattern 'works'... Might do that tommorrow, 'Play-day 2'!

PLAY-DAY! yay!

Drew this Big Boy up last night & spent almost the entire day on him today. Hard work? Yeah, but more like play! :D

Ive nicknamed this guy 'R2-D-Tiki' -and those little 'berries' attached to he feet are gone now. Oh yeah, and he stands upright! More progress on him tommorrow, Ill get a shot of him standing...

All play and no (real) work makes Tama a Happee boy...

TamaTheTired-from-all-the-playing :)