I’m excited to share that I have written an advice hack for the Uptime app called Getting Started in Wood Carving: Choosing the Right Tools. My hack covers the basics of selecting carving tools for the beginning wood carver. It gives a brief overview of the challenges of choosing the right tools, and then provides a list of the 12 tools that are a great start for the beginning wood carver. Below is an embed of a sample section of the hack for you to view: Once you have set up the app you can access my hack directly using this LINK, or by searching using my name. The Uptime app offers a wide r ..read more

Samhain this year marks two years since I launched my Patreon page, and in thinking about that milestone, I decided it was time to make some adjustments and updates to the structure and function of my support tiers. It has been a wonderful thing for me to build a relationship with my supporters over the last two years through this platform, and my gratitude for it is about much more than the financial support it provides. What I find in this relationship is an exchange of kindness – the kindness of my patrons’ support met with the kindness of me making and sharing my artwork with them. It is a ..read more

During the month of September I will have two of my wood carvings on display at the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen Meredith Fine Craft Gallery located in the heart of the beautiful Lakes Region of NH. On display will be two of my snowy owl wood carvings that are part of a group show of owl themed work created by League juried members. “Old Woman of the Night” is hand carved from basswood with an oil painted and wax finish.  It is ready-to-hang and measures 12″ x 12″ x 2″. “Watchful” is also hand carved from basswood with an oil painted and wax finish, and is carved in the round. It mea ..read more

As an extension of the Tutorials section on the website, I have made one of my favorite carving templates available in a 30 page PDF called “Intertwined Hearts Wood Carving Pattern & Guide“: This wood carving pattern resource includes 2 versions of the carving pattern for creating an Intertwined Hearts wall hanging. There are 20 reference photos showing examples of the different stages of the carving process, from different angles and different species of wood. Also included is an outline of the steps to follow to plan your carving project. This is one of my most popular carving designs ..read more

This year I will be participating in the League of NH Craftsmen’s Fair in two ways. First – I am very pleased to have my Sleeping Bear Triptych woodcarving on display as part of the Art, Craft & Design Exhibition at the Fair. The exhibition has it’s own large tent in the center of the grounds, and displays a wide range of works by League members in a gallery setting. This is my first time exhibiting this piece, and it is available to purchase. The Fair runs from August 6-14, 2022 at the Mount Sunapee Resort in Newbury, NH, with hours from 10:00 am – 5:00 pm daily. You can find out all of t ..read more

You may have heard on social media last week that there was a strike against Etsy. The strike was in part a protest against the new fee structure that went into use on April 11th, a 30% hike in commission fees for the platform. Sellers closed their stores using vacation mode and asked buyers to skip ordering from the site for the week as a protest against the fee hike as well as recent changes in seller policies that hurt smaller sellers like myself. I spent a lot of time thinking about my Etsy shop last week and have decided to shift to selling directly through the Ninth Wave Designs website ..read more

I’m very excited to announce the launch of Wild Wood New Hampshire – a collection of wood carvings that explore and celebrate the wildlife that we share our homes with, in the lakes and mountain regions as well as the more urban areas of New Hampshire. Follow this link to see the full portfolio of work that makes up this collection. I have created a portfolio of one-of-a-kind wood carvings available exclusively through the Ninth Wave Designs website. These carvings offer the opportunity to bring the wilder side of New Hampshire inside, providing a unique visual focal point in the styling of yo ..read more

This original wood carving is inspired by the constellation Ursa Major, the Great Bear. I designed this piece to reflect a feeling of reverence for the sacredness of nature, a religious icon if you will, to the vast beauty of the night sky, and a celebration of the patterns that we find there. In star lore the Great Bear is a fearless mother to Ursa Minor, and her familiar ladle-shaped pattern is among the first constellations that we learn to recognize as children. She watches over us from the heavens, just as she does her own Little Bear. In designing this carving I started with a tradition ..read more

As a woodcarver it seems almost inevitable that one will eventually carve a Green Man. When I was first learning how to carve I subscribed to the video carving lessons expertly produced by Chris Pye, and he has created some of the more appealing Green Man carvings I have seen. Following his inspiration I have tried to design a Green Man carving on several occasions, and have each time been unsatisfied with the results. I began again recently by first doing some research into the history of this motif, going back before the figure became a popular emblem of the newly pagan and environmentally c ..read more

Imbolc has always held a special significance for me among the cross-quarter holidays. It may have less of an established awareness among those in the US, and is seems like a quieter and more contemplative mark of the passage of time through the cycle of the year, but there is a lot of interesting tradition beneath that quiet exterior. I was reminded of this recently when I stumbled upon a podcast called Brigid in Folk Tradition. Blúiríní Béaloidis / Folklore Fragments is a National Folklore Collection Podcast produced at University College in Dublin, Ireland, and has a series of very interest ..read more