Darrin's Woodspirits and Barkcarvings.

Willie the Woodspirit

Willie the Woodspirit loved to play,
he'd dance and sing and run all day.
He'd teach the newborn birds to sing,

and mend a Robin's broken wing.

Til' one day while running in the woods,
an evil spirit before him stood.
He cast a spell to make Willie sleep,
and placed him in a tree to keep.

There he stayed for many years,
until one day when what did he hear,
a chopping sound, some scrapes, some cuts.
Willie thought that he'd finally gone nuts!
But the sounds grew louder, they were getting so close.
Before Willie knew it he could wiggle his nose,
and soon he felt the wind on his cheek,
could he dare open his eyes to take one quick peek.
He summoned his courage and opened one eye,
he looked all around and up to the sky.
When what did he see when he gazed up above,

a man with a chisel, a hat and a glove.

A man with a wonderful look in his eyes,
a man who had listened and heard Willie's cries,
and set Willie free from his prison of timber,
this carver of wood he will always remember.

A poem by Darrin Tissandier
Email me at tissandier@tds.net Please come back soon and visit me.

Links to other sites on the Web
Wispy's World of Woodcarving
Woodcarving links
Sculptures and Wood Spirits by Dave Maggard
Link to Woodcarvers mail list and Woodcarver E-zine
Mike Sadkin, Liberator of Woodspirits
FLEXCUT carving tools!!
Mountain Heritage Crafters, carving suppies.

My Carving History
This is a brief history of how I got started in Woodcarving. Lets go back to June of 1997, I've always been kind of artisticly (is that a word) inclined, drawing pictures and some clay sculpture. One day I decided to get internet access and that pretty much changed everything. While surfing the web one day I happened upon a Canadian gentlemans web page Wispy's World of Woodcarving in it he gave an in depth description of how to do Bark Carvings, which I was fascinated by. I tried one and it came out swell, showed it to some friends and they all wanted one so now I was in dire need of a Cottonwood tree for bark. The tree had to be big enough and dead to get the proper bark. Well there are not to many Cottonwood trees down in this part of Ohio so most of my first bark carving were done in Locust bark which is a bit more abundant but not quite as good as cottonwood. One day while horseback ridin' down at the crick (thats what we call a creek down here) I happened upon the only cottonwood tree that I have ever seen down here. And it was big enough and dead, had been for quite a while. I was extactic and my friends who I had been riding with thought I had flipped out. I jumped off my horse and ran over to the tree marveling at my lucky find. The next day my dad and I (dad also is a bark carver now) took a little hike and brought out as much as we could carry and the rest is history, well at least it is to me. I had also in this time frame been carving and selling walking sticks with spirits in them. This Christmas I received as a gift my first set of micro carving tools and now I'm in the pencil carving business and I can't seem to carve enough of them to keep up with demand. I sell them for 5 bucks. Everyone usually has 5 bucks on them so they go fast. Well thats about it for now. Thanks for visiting and I will soon have more pictures of my stuff to view so came back soon.

© 1997 tissandier@tds.net
Woodcarvers BBS .

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