Hello

Today see's me turning 41. As good a day to start a blog, I'd say.  It's not a huge age, but certainly no spring chicken any more. Either way, it is not something that particularly bothers me: I've had an interesting life which has seen me travel the world, settle down in a new country, find love and become the father of 2 wonderful children. I have ridden fast motorbikes on race tracks, had my heart broken and broken bones. Everything heals with a little time and a good whisky.

The career path I chose nearly 20 years ago, has lurched and spluttered around in a rather unspectacular way and only in the last few years have I learnt some very important lessons about seizing opportunity, sacrifice and one day being able to regard myself as a success professionally. Having spent the last 20 years spending my time in the IT/Telecoms sector, I started to realise about 10 years ago, that in many aspects it has been quite unfulfilled. Corporate ladders, internal politics and the effort that many people put in to be something tat they are not has left me underwhelmed. 4 years ago, I was made redundant 2 weeks before Christmas, and 3 months before the birth of my daughter. This event led me to start my own company which was one of the most rewarding periods of my life. Unfortunately not financially! I'm now back working for a small IT company where I can use many of the lessons I learnt grafting on my own.

The thing that dawned on me about 10 years ago, was that I had never really made anything. I had nothing tangible to show for my professional life. I had always enjoyed the creative process when I was younger. Whether that was in the form of music or sitting down with a knife and a piece of wood and carving a life sized replica of a match. But out of some difficult times in my life, I found myself becoming more and more drawn to creating. It started with some small pieces of curly birch which I started to carve into rings and pendents. Collecting drift wood from the beach to make into mirror frames or even embarrassing attempts at painting. All of these little activities helped to calm my soul down and gave me a great deal of pleasure at the same time. I had finally created something. However small.

The next step came when I found out I was to become a father. I had an urge to create something just for her. I talked about it with my wife and the idea of a cradle was born. A design was found, plans purchased and some nice white oak with which to make the cradle. 8 months later and with a week to spare it was complete.

The cradle was made in a tiny shed with a minimum of tools, a lot of thought and a good deal of luck!! It all went together nicely and has now been used for both of our children. So far this is the piece of work I am most proud of. Even if it is the only one!

The idea for this blog is to start to document the ideas and projects that are now filling my mind. This will be a long term thing as I will need to build a garage first to house the tools I will need to buy in order to try my hand at all of the things I would like to. Just some of the things I would like to tackle are building a strip canoe, wood turning, learning blacksmith techniques on a handmade forge. I would also love to be able to make tree houses, go karts and other things that will make my children's childhood so special. And maybe a bit of fun for me too!!

Ultimately, this is my attempt to create a lasting impression on the world in a good way. Blogging about it gives me the chance to put some of my jumbled thoughts down in a way that may even be interesting.

Who knows.