[Bartster]

ron,

i am sorry to say that i just found this thread, and i am also sorry to hear about your setback. you are in out thoughts and prayers.

bart

[Claude]

Ok - Ron, here's a try at carving a word picture for you. Over in General Carving there is a thread where I put some photos of the James River Woodcarvers Competition this past weekend. Since you can't see any of the photos, let me try to describe one of them for you - I'll pick, say, mine!

The Gingerbread Santa
The santa is 8 inches tall, standing on a one inch thick piece of glossy walnut base, which is round, but cut so the sides slope at about 10 degrees off vertical, making the top of the stand just a bit smaller than the bottom - truncated cone, in math-speak. The santa has a full length robe, red, that has 6 buttons on the front, double-breasted style. The robe has a built-in short cape that covers the shoulders. He is wearing the standard stocking cap with the white pom-pom hanging over his right ear. He has a big smile on his face, and his beard and hair is detailed with a small v-tool. His arms are bent with his hands out to the sides at shoulder level, palms up. In each palm, he is balancing a gingerbread man about 1.25 inches tall. The gingerbread man has white eyes and smile, and red, white and green buttons on his front. From Santas right hand dangles a wire with two gingerbread men hooked on, one above the other, plus a small white star and a couple of pieces of holly with berries. The leaves of the holly are about 1/4 inch long with a very small cluster of 3 berries between a pair of leaves. From Santa's left hand dangles another wire with a holly leaf cluster on it, plus a gingerbread house, which is about 1.5 inches tall. The house has carved shingles, a chimney, one door in front, a window on each side and another window in the back. Surrounding each window and the door are carved gum drops, alternating in color from red, white, and green, and repeat. In front of the house is a small green mailbox with white stand. Just to the side of the Santa, in the photo, is the blue ribbon for first place in Intermediate Caricature.

Ok - please let me know if this helps you "see" the photo a bit. If it does, I'll try to describe any of the others you'd like to hear about.

Claude

[Ron Davidson]

First of all Congradulations on the ribbon! The description you gave was excellant. It sounds like you put a great deal of time into this project and it was worth it. Thanks Ron