This is a post about a Chainsaw Carving Festival. We’ll get to that. First, we need to mention some carving we did before that…
Being that our campsite is located right within the bulk of the regular campers we admit that we are often quite alert and curious when someone new pulls in beside us. Neighbors in a campground can definitely be like a ‘Box of Chocolates’ and we knew these folks were coming for the long haul of twelve full days and nights. Their rig was about three times longer than ours with rims that screamed bling bling. Backing a big rig into these tight spots is quite an art form and we can typically tell what kind of neighbors we will have by how they treat each other during this process. One shot, with the woman driving and the man directing and they were in! At this point, we figured they had to be alright but had no idea that we were about to meet two new life-long friends. What a wonderful twelve days we had sharing travel and other stories and getting to know these folks.
One day, Lynn found out that she had the same Birthday as Darlene and it was game on for a celebration and some Birthday Cake.
That’s where our side story on whittling comes in (sort of)…
Lynn is still learning how to use their convection oven. So, despite her thoughtful efforts, special tools were needed to sample the goods!
Apparently, claws (not axes and saws) are the perfect option.
At least someone enjoyed the special treats inside (nuts and cranberries).
We didn’t suffer for too long though. Bob entered with reinforcements from the local market and we feasted and celebrated with little effort. Sure will miss these two and look forward to meeting up with them somewhere, sometime.
And now… whittling on wood.
The Corp was putting up an information and give-away booth at the Addison Chainsaw Festival and asked if we would volunteer. So, we covered ourselves in red and headed on out.
The festival itself was a pretty neat gig. Fifty plus carvers wielding chainsaws of all sizes (one guy said he owned 26 different ones) each creating various masterpieces that would be auctioned off to raise money for the local society for the blind. Here’s a sampling of their works.
We witnessed this lion emerging from just a raw stump of wood. It was amazing to see the carver create each wave of hair in mane and pull out the basic shape of the face before adding the details.
Some folks paint or stain or oil their pieces. This guy was using fire to create various shades of brown and black by burning his piece.
Have a sweet day!