Teaching Children Lovespoon Carving
Just before Christmas, I was asked if I would give a brief talk on lovespoons, and then give a carving demo at a local charity event.
No problem I thought. I can talk for awhile and a carving demo is no problem. Well, best placed plans and all that. The entire 4 hours was spent teaching lovespoon carving, mainly children, but also 3 – 4 adults.
One thing I did find; Two grand fathers each helping their grandchild . Very quickly, the grand children were taken out of the equation, and the two grand fathers were in competition with each other. Neither would leave the table until convinced he had produced the superior lovespoon.
There was no such competition amongst the children. The ages ranged from 6 through to 14, with roughly an even mix of male and female.
The children were great. The concentration etched on faces showed the effort being put into the carving, until one by one, they walked away clutching their newly carved lovespoon, with one or two of them showing signs of future carving potential.
Whilst the evening was harder than expected, watching little fingers and razor sharp chisels was quite stressful, it was one of the most enjoyable evenings spent at fayres or events.
Having worried about the children’s fingers with the chisels, there were only two cuts in the 4 hours, both on my fingers – seems I worried about nothing.