Kitebuilder.com's

[knotronda]

[kiteguy]

[Kitesquid]

Well here I am back at work and tired from my trip to the Fort.

I had sooooo much fun building kites with some great people and I even came home with a kite or two myself.

I took Dan Kurahashi's classes and I love the little Cody I built.

I even had a chance to stick my head in on some other classes on Sunday.

WOW am I tired...
_________________
VR/
KiteSquid
AKA TakoIka
AKA Harold
King George VA

P.S. The wind is like the air, only pushier.

[dpb]

I have to echo all the lauds other’s had about the conference. Wished I had more time to spend with all, but it was a busy time. I admit I spent most evenings in house socializing with Don and Jeanne Mock and several others (Barbara from this forum was there, and Scott Skinner, Kathy Goodwind, Bazzer and Kim, Ralf and Eva from Denmark…).

My class went well, and pretty much everybody left with a kite (actually had 2 people from Kitebuilders: Rich Durant and Barbara, hope you both enjoyed yourselves). In any case I enjoyed myself and learned as much about teaching the class as the people in it (e.g. I learned the trouble spots, and what stages needed extra supervision for the people in the class).

Kitesquid came away with the nicest raffle prize (I’ll let Harold brag).

There were too many good classes, and I of course was limited in the classes I could take. The Philippine fighter kite was very interesting (more bamboo shaping and lashing). I also did the “3-D box” kite, which is really a bowed kite. Ralf (from Germany), who taught the class, definitely had the best “manual” for a class. He had photos and descriptions for every step. I am going to have to revamp my manual now that I have seen his.

It was good to see everyone and hope to do it again.

By the way, one of the reasons I spent so much time in the evenings with Don Mock is that he is a very good friend, and he just got through with surgery for cancer on the roof of his mouth. He is headed for several weeks of radiation treatments, starting this week. Prognosis is good, but it’s going to be rough. If you are inclined towards sending cards, I suspect he wouldn’t mind them. Don’t send maudlin cards though. Keep them funny/sarcastic. Let him know you’re thinking about him, but don’t bring him down; he’s needs to keep his attitude and morale up. He’s got the spiritual/philosophical aspects covered, so what he needs is something to make him smile when he gets home from a rough day of radiation.

Dave Butler

[woodpekr]

[dpb]

Don is almost always upbeat, especially in adversity. Still a joke now and then never hurt.

By the way, I forgot to mention that Lindsay (KnotRonda's husband) made me some great little line winders for the miniature kites.

And I showed Harold (Kitesquid) two tools that actually seemed to make him drool. One is a "whip finisher", which is a fly tying tool for applying a cinch to a spar lashing, at a minuscule scale. The other was a barrel knot tool, which allows you to tie a perfect barrel knots on .003-inch diameter waxed thread.

By the way Rich, I was more talking about that fact that everyone needed help with their bamboo tension spars, though your brief experiment with bamboo splitting definitely got my attention.

Dave Butler

[woodpekr]

Here's a few pics of what I did at Fort Worden
Mini Box kite. Be sure to check out the line winder
2D Box Tower Kite
Bill Bigge telling us about the Janus Glider Kite. Here's another profile of the Janus. Ken and Kite Squid in both of those photos to the left and right respectively.

These are shots from my album
_________________
Rich Durant
Portland, Oregon

[knotronda]

Where's the picture of your raffle win??? I had to drag it over to you. The least you can do is brag a little.

knot(tier)ronda

[woodpekr]