Roadrunners from forged nails

A friend sent this roadrunner made from cut flooring nails,

This caused a light bulb to come on, I have some forged nails that I just throw in a can, so i started gas welding them and the result is below.

 this is the first try.

Here is the second

Both mounted on a horseshoe and coated with paste wax finish

Recent Hand forged knives

• 1st forged knife from a cylinder wall, 
• heat treated in super quench
• not sure of carbon content, but will take a edge, 
• ,doesn't hold very long, but will shave. 
• handle is maple, attached with 3/16 brass pins and JB weld :), Coated with boiled linseed oil
• Sheath is some leather from the scrap bin, probably 6oz. hand tooled and hand sewn with saddle stitch. need to improve on tooling and stitching but always need to improve.

• 2nd forged knife,
• lawnmower blade, will shave, again, doesnt hold edge as long as desired
• heat treated in super quench
• not sure of carbon content, but will take a edge,d
• doesn't hold very long, but will shave. 
• Handle is walnut with 1/4" o.d. copper tubing for pins, JB weld again Coated with boiled linseed oil

• RR spike with twisted handle with skull forged in head of spike
• not completed at yet.

• Tim Tellander, ABS Journeyman Bladesmith was my tutor on this,
• 4th forged knife, drop point with boxwood handle and brass pins, coated with boiled linseed oil.
• 6 1/2" 1084 carbon steel
• Tim enlightened me on grinding, sequence, taper, WAAAAY TOOOO much to learn, will be learning a long time
• Heat treated in 140* quenching oil, tempered to blue
• Shaves and holds edge better than my first two, knowledge and material helps
• 1st Pouch sheath, left hand carry, veg tan, hand sewn, saddle stitch, neats foot oil finish

April 25,2015 Hail storm

• lost power for 23 hours, lots of damage to power grid on Duke road, 1/2 mile to the north of peaceful lane.
• several tree limbs down, no major trees,
• one limb hit green house and messed up the front edge of roof but no leaks
• a lot of hail, 
• beat about half of the leaves off the trees and knocked a bunch of small limbs off of trees
• house roof damaged, finally replaced July, roofers all busy
• workshop roof damaged, finally replaced July, roofers all busy
• north side vinyl siding has holes and cracks from hail stikes, still working on replacement
• Ellen's 2012 Focus had damage to hood
• My 2014 F150 had damage to hood and roof
• both were under cover but hail came in at an angle
• took about a month to clean up the debris in the yard working a little while every day, this includes the back half of our 3 1/2 acres, which had quite a few limbs down.
• finished the clean up around 8-15-15.

Charlotte, pet garden spider

not a very good video.

We have been watching this spider for awhile, she has laid two egg sacks and is probably working on a third.

we occassionally place bugs in her web, it is interesting to watch when she runs down to 'wrap' thing up and paralyze the bug,

you can see her fangs .

when she finishes draining the bugs, they are very flat.