notes from a balcony bench

Spoons carved from wood that was still a tree last week.

A spoon carver's notebook from Šiauliai: splitting fresh birch and alder, axe work at the block, knife grips, stropping, slow drying and oiling.

Šiauliai, Lithuaniacarving since 2022

Read the carving notes

End grain of a birch round, split through the pith. Each half becomes one cooking spoon once the pith comes out.

On the drying shelf

Each note is written after the spoon has dried and been used for a while, so it can say what held and what cracked.

Finishing · eating spoon

Drying slowly, oiling once, and what the cracked spoons taught me

Why green spoons crack and twist as they dry, runout in handles, finishing cuts on dry wood, oiling with linseed, and the danger of oily rags.

Carved 11 July 2026 · 8 min read

Knives · cooking spoon

Knife grips I use every evening, and keeping the edge alive

The sloyd and hook knives on my balcony bench, the chest lever and thumb-pull grips, hollowing a bowl across the grain, and stropping little and often.

Carved 6 September 2025 · 9 min read

Axe · scoop

Axe work at the chopping block: roughing out a spoon safely

Block height, how I hold a small carving axe, stop cuts at the neck, the order in which wood comes off, and the ways axe work still goes wrong for me.

Carved 15 March 2025 · 8 min read

Wood · spatula

Splitting a fresh birch log into spoon blanks in a shared yard

How I pick green wood as a flat-dweller, what birch, alder and cherry are like under the knife, splitting through the pith, and keeping billets wet.

Carved 19 October 2024 · 8 min read

Four rules chalked on the chopping block

I carve spoons from freshly cut wood on a small bench on my balcony in Šiauliai, and I write down what each log, cut and mistake taught me before I forget it.

Split along the grain; a sawn plank never makes a strong spoon.
Stop cuts at the neck before the axe goes anywhere near it.
Strop before the knife feels dull, not after.
Dry it slowly, finish it dry, oil it thinly.