Wackadoodle

As I said before, this year is about creating for the sake of creating...what that actually means is that I am pulling out half done projects and trying to interject some life into them...and getting the pieces off the work bench and shelves.  So far I have been pretty successful with the ones attempted.  Due to time passed and new revelations as to how to proceed or simply forgetting how the outcome was supposed to be, I have attended to a couple of these hanging chads, the above piece being one of them.

The caricature design loosely came from a Christmas card, which when translated with wire became his own identity.  I made the book long and thin to match the shape of the head, covering it with fun balloon paper from my stash.  And that is the state in which it sat for months.  Some days I would pick it up and wiggle it around to see if an idea for future progress would pop into my head, but alas, it was always replaced on the shelf, waiting.  Along side it sat a sturdy hinge piece with 2 holes ready for future attachments found during one of my wanderings.

On a day when the wind was blowing ideas around just right, I gathered the book reader and the hinge and started digging around in my stash. I enjoy working with the hand drills because I like the look of the mechanism and the movement is already created for me.  My brain worked out the connection of the pieces and with a trial run I had great expectations.   I tightened a dowel into the top of the hand drill and one through the hinge, connected with rope, with the intention of a simple up and down movement of the hinge.  Nope (I should be used to this by now), once again wrong mechanics.  The rope twisted around the drill shaft when the crank was turned.  Well, yeah, of course.  It is always so simple to see after the fact.  By this time I had already carved the hole for the handle and attached it to the base with  a dowel and a piece of copper.  There was no going back.

Ok...up and down ...up and down... I have a tendency to hold the problem piece and give the motion I want until I either figure it out or put it back on the shelf...this has taken hours in some cases. Thanks to a yard sale can filled with odds and ends...I have a hard time passing these up due to what treasures might be contained within...I had a yellowed, plastic wheel with a handle attached.  Score!   This would give me the up and down when the drill handle was cranked.  Now I had to figure out attachment of the wheel.  I had some copper tubing that I flattened one end and screwed to the back of the base at the height I needed to have the wheel float over the top of the bit holder. With a bit of finagling, I was able to get just the right amount of hinge rise to correspond with the circular movement of the handle.  When the handle is turned the reader pops up and down in a joyously  erratic way.  Hence the name Wackadoodle.

Today had the opportunity to be a full day, but with decisions made, it is going to be a day of rest.  It is ok to be the piece on the shelf, just sitting quietly.

May your day be full of peace,
Hilari