|

Serving Tray

Good Ideas Don’t Need to be Complicated

Serving Tray

For an object to complete the journey from initial musings to touchable reality requires a certain fidelity, on my part, to the original idea. Discouragements take the form of excessively complex prototypes. It is difficult to let simplicity rule.

The journey of the serving tray couldn’t be shorter. I commented that the circle of influences on what I make would widen if staff started making suggestions to me. “What about a serving tray,” was the instant reply. There are fifty metres between my front door and my friends’ place. At the end of the short walk home there was a serving tray in my head. That tray is identical to the one we made.

Teaching can be unpredictable. The best prepared lesson can be  bummer! But, for this tray, all the stars aligned themselves. We sanded, constructed, then lacquered. As that happened we all giggled over inappropriate jokes. Our session progressed, and finished, in warm happiness. Was it the tray? Was it the people? There were five pieces of wood, glue and fixings, all of which were donated. Two wonderful hours in disability. It was just good! Thanks for a nice morning.

That’s not all folks.

Similar Posts

  • | |

    Without a Workshop

    Work with my disabled friends depends heavily on efficient batch production. For reasons not worth recounting my workshop is out of action for about a year. So, work with my friends has stalled, horribly! To maintain our hands together relationship I need to invent stuff that requires very little wood machining.  Here are two pieces…

  • |

    Note Pad

    Our shopping basket seemed to take foreverrrrrr to finish, but that was only because a few of my disabled friends renewed their love for sanding and painting. It was a good thing, for the results were so good we decided to give the baskets to our mothers for Mothers’ Day. But it wasn’t quite Mothers’…

  • |

    Simple machines

    Simple Machines Blogging takes time and my recent past has involved a sick wife and a new grandchild. Suburban life is rich with texture. It can make blogging take a back seat. Following is a report of a nice afternoon in my shed with my son! My disabled friends haven’t been ignored, the next blog…

  • | |

    Fire Engines

    My friends were impressed by the notion that our train’s carriages could be hooked together and towed around. It failed, however, in that each woodworker could only take home a single carriage; they had nothing to tow. At the end of the train project, and experiencing a flush of overconfidence, I asked staff for inspiration. They requested a fire…