Update

Hi Everyone,

Sorry for the long time between posts, it’s been a very busy year for me with 8 months of traveling, the weeks seem to be flying past!

In early March I had a wonderful trip to Rarotonga for my daughters wedding, what a fabulous place and a great time with family and friends, a big thankyou to all who came to celebrate Carly & James’s big day with us:)

Raro is very laid back and uncommercial. Definitely a place we all want to go back to. First priority when we got there was to hire scooters and head to the Cook Islands police station to get our drivers licences. Scooters are definitely the best way to get around Rarotonga which has a ring road around it and lots of roads off that heading into the middle of the island. The boys even managed to find some good offroading territory, not sure if that was covered in the rental agreement, haha!!

Enjoyed a beautiful wedding on the beach. A big thanks to everyone at the Palm Grove Resort for all they did to make it a very special day:)

Then it was back home briefly before heading to Queensland Australia for the 10th anniversary Turnfest. David Drescher bought all the previous demonstrators that could make it from the last 10 years. David and his team did a great job and a lot of fun was had by all. As I only had to give 2 demonstrations over the weekend it was nice to have plenty of time off to check out other demonstrations, catch up with friends and hang out at the beach which was just across the road from the venue:)

After Turnfest I headed to Ross Annels place in Cooroy, an hour or so north of Brisbane. Ross is an accomplished furniture maker www.rossannels.com and along with his partner Tamsin Kerr established Cooroora Institute www.cooroorainstitute.org

Ross invited me to teach a design and surface workshop, which was a nice change from the noise and dust of a woodturning workshop. I had a diverse and very open group of students including a glass worker, ceramist, painter, furniture maker as well as a local woodturner.

www.richardvaughan.com.au where I did an evening presentation and similar design and surface workshop with another fun group of Richards students. Thanks to Ross and Richard for putting everything together and to all those who came and joined in the fun:)

Today I just arrived back in Brisbane to visit with Richard again after teaching a 3 day hands on woodturning class at Cooroora with a group of students from my March classes. Was a lot of fun and great to be the first class in Ross’s new building which is destined to become a fantastic teaching and Art Library facility. Thanks again Ross:)

Early May I headed to Nth America for 3 and a half months. First up was a demo/class tour of North California, Silicon Vally, Bay Area, Norcal, Kern and Central Coast Woodturners. A huge thanks to Dean Adkins for organising the logistics of this tour as well as his efforts as area coordinator the the AAW Symposium in San Jose, great job Dean!!
And many thanks also to all those who helped with organising the venues, hosting and moving me from place to place:)

Then I got to enjoy a 2 day road trip across Nevada with Jim Rodgers www.jlrodgers.com to Provo where I demonstrated for Craft Supplies www.woodturnerscatalog.com at their Super Wednesday event and the Utah Symposium, great to catch up with everyone in Utah and thanks to all at Craft Supplies and Treeline:)

After Utah it was on the road again with Keith Gotschall www.keithgotschall.com to spend a few days with him and his family in Salida, CO. We played in the workshop a bit and also took some time off for a bit of sightseeing in the mountains near Salida, the old ghost town of St Elmo was amazing, I just wanted to take one of those cute chipmunks home!!:)

After Keith’s I spent some time with Tom & Melinda Worsing www.thomaswirsing.com at Bad Dog Ranch near Boulder.

Nick Agar www.turningintoart.com from England joined us also for a few days of fun. I gave a hands-on class in Tom’s workshop and also got some time to make a coloborative piece with Tom which we donated for the AAW auction in San Jose. Nicest thing was Melinda was determined this piece was going back home with her!!

I also got to visit John and Peggy Lynch in EstesPark, www.johnlynchwoodworking.com John and Peggy visited me in NZ many years ago and it was so nice to see them again after so long. John has a real nice workshop and gallery at their place:)

And I got to see a bit of the Rockies and the amazing wildlife. The Elk were calving in town at Estes Park and also got to see some of that that white stuff we don’t get in Northland, nice for a quick visit on a sunny day!!!

Here’s some pics to show that I still get a bit of time to make stuff, recently I got to spend a bit of time with Alain Mailland and his family in France. Had a fabulous stay there:) I got to help Babette with some bowl turning, bought back memories of my years of production bowl turning and this is a collaborative piece I made with Alain that he will be showing with Thomas Riley Gallery at SOFA Chicago this November:)

Cheers for now:)