There are many beautiful things in nature, but one of my favorites is wood from the oak tree. With distinctive grain pattern and rugged durability, it’s long been one of my first choices of material from which to create things. Years ago I ran across an article that described how to make keepsake baby rattles. All you needed, it seemed, was a wood lathe and lots of patience. Possessing at least the first of these, I gave the project a try. And to my artistic satisfaction, I was able to learn to craft these unique infant noise-makers.
The rattles, pictured, are just under six inches long and turned from solid pieces of oak. The rings that make the noise when shaken, were undercut and freed from the basic stock. As such, they cannot be removed. Aside from the basic turning method, only the craftsman’s creativity determines the finished design of each rattle. It can end up being as singularly unique as the piece of wood from which it was fashioned.
2 comments:
Of course you can make them....what can't you do?(other than possibly a social butterfly)
Exquisite in every possible way! - the grain of the wood, the shades of it (I adore oak too), the different and perfectly created shapes on both rattles, the soft sounds I can hear in my mind when I imagine rattling them - and nothing will convince me that the rings crept on and refuse to come off because of anything other than the magic in the hands of the magician/sculptor.
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