Another good Saturday morning.

You should all be familiar with how this Saturday morning club came to be from the June and July article. So this was our third and is already recognised as a regular event taking on some permanent characteristics, that's not to say we are not adaptable but some things just happen and that's fine and we adapt around them. The previous two meetings where to sound things out and the feed back was brilliant, this meeting was the first in our year and it was time to enrol as proper members, everybody remembered and paid there membership and after a brief chat we where off again.

This time we had the computer set up with scanner printer and digital camera, Tyson made a brilliant job of organising it, I was very impressed, pictures of the mornings activity scrolling around and all filed away and I'm pleased to see that he got to do some turning to. Kim brought in a turned Ant, very simple turning, spindle work, just right for the members, it had hair grips bent for the legs and antenna and with a bit of pyrography it looked very effective, the juniors thought it was brilliant.

Ken gave us a big box of almost ready to use blanks, and with the box I have we can turn pretty much anything on a Saturday. We have to date set a theme for the meetings but its not set in stone, young Jordan knows what he wants and isn't afraid to say so which is good, he wanted another Mushroom and so I set to and he/we turned it, very specific detail he wanted to, that's very encouraging.

I have to apologise to the other helpers as I didn't get to leave my lathe apart from the mid morning break, so I didn't see what they got up to, the idea is eventually to have a couple of turners per lathe or activity so we can all move around and have a break and of coarse there's always that bit more experience to gather. Angy managed the pyrography as Derek was away and once again this proved to be very popular, young Kayleigh keeps my machine at home now so hopefully Blythe and Emily her school friends will use it between meetings to.

Ken, Mike and John where new helpers today and they looked like they really enjoyed it, it's was an ideal opportunity to use their skills to help these new enthusiastic turners, I did put out a call for help as we where short this meeting and true to form the members backed me up so many thanks to them.

It takes a bit of setting up the night before this Saturday club and I hope the helpers keep coming, I for one bring loads once we loose those television monitors out of the cupboard there will be more room so things can stay here. The aim is to give these turners as much lathe time as we can while they are here, so the more lathes we have set up the better but it does take a while, James came on Friday to help and I'll encourage others to, and of coarse there's the putting away, Craig.

We had a tea break this time, we decided 3hrs straight was to long, it was useful as it gave us all time to chat, the three girls sat behind the pyrography, I think Ill encourage everybody to sit out in the open next time as we all need to chat to each other. All the young ones turned with me this time, honey dippers and mushrooms, there beginning to pick up the movement required to suit the cut, slowly they will do more and I will do less, Kayleigh can turn to the round pretty much on her own now but in the quiet atmosphere of the workshop.

We had some new members but I only remember one name, hopefully I'll have time to meet them better next time, I think that's very important. All in all it went very well, a combination of things I think. The juniors finished and gathered their things and said goodbye, next time I think we should finish the meeting proper but we'll see, just before we all went I asked for any comments, I duly noted those and thanked everybody for their time and effort, it just remained for me to put all that gear back in the Tardis and lock the hall up, and there goes another good Saturday morning.

Boots - September 2007