Enough is Enough

You may or may not be aware, my first name is Wendy. All of my life, I have only known a few Wendys. For the most part, I've only needed a first name; kind of like Cher. Yeah, that's it, kind of like Cher.

In the past couple of years, in our village, in the middle of nowhere there has been a sudden influx of Wendys. I believe it is now up to six. People are starting to call me Wendy L---- (which doesn't feel like me), Wendy L or Wendy E. Unacceptable!

On the way home from a social engagement the other night, I decided that I need a new name, so that I can be an individual again.

Henceforth, I will be known as

Zeke

Thanks for your co-operation.

The Fashion Show Trip

On Wednesday, a group of us went to Hamilton to a fashion show/ silent auction (fund raiser).

Here is the beginnings of the group checking into the lobby at the hotel.

Lynda and I got to our room and first things first we checked out our view. We had the best view, we could see Lake Ontario and we saw some lake boats (ships?) out there.

Next we stowed our luggage.

and made sure there were no unexpected guests in our room.

We were happy with our digs, so it was time to wander down the hall.

We brought a few little nibblies to have in the hotel room with our wine after checking in.

Then off to the fashion show. The pictures during the show didn't turn out very well because of the lighting, so this was before it all got started.

The next morning we went to Blackbird Studio to check out more of their designs than we saw the previous night.

We all had a great time trying things on.

Here's the whole group ... time to think about heading home and let them get to work for their next fashion show.

Sheet Metal Art

How cool is my Dad - aka Gryper?!

One of the things we have to do while building the double bass is take these thin "sheets" of maple that we have planed to around 2mm thick, and bend them to form the sides of the double bass.

We have a bending iron which is a tool that is about 6 inches high and heats up, then you bend the sides around it shaping them to fit the sides of the double bass. The sides of the double bass are about 9 inches high.

So here is a picture of the bending iron.

Gryper did some sheet metal art and built us an extension for it so our bending iron is now 9" high. Despite his being frustrated and it having taken quite a few hours, it works incredibly well. Here is the bending iron with the new extension fitted.

Here's Bethany starting to bend the first piece of side rib.

We found that, as with everything we've done with this so far, it goes much easier with four hands than two.

Here is the mould and you can see the ribs have been glued in on the "C bouts" (the waist)

The first one took us well over an hour to get bent to fit exactly, the second one was bent and glued in in half an hour.

Once again, Gryper's sheet metal art saves the day.

Progress

We are making progress on the double bass. The mould has taken us some time to figure out and then build. We spent yesterday and today shaping the blocks at the corners and the top & bottom. We're really pleased with our efforts.

We decided to put the pieces together (sort of) in their current state. There's still a lot of work to be done, but it was exciting to see it taking shape. You can see the iguana that Bethany has carved on top of the scroll. It's very impressive and is going to be gorgeous!