Poker Work

The Victorians were very fond of a craft known as pyrography - poker work.Wooden ornaments were decorated by burning in a design using a hot poker. These days you can buy electrical gadgets similar to soldering irons for the same purpose. I have two pieces of pyrography - a box on my desk, which holds stamps [a gift from my cousin Gill] and in my sewing box, a small screwtop needlecase [a gift from some Baptist Ladies from Bulgaria]

I needed a poker - now we are frequently enjoying looking at the flames and feeling the warmth of our open fire, a poker seemed important.

Bob, being Bob, went off to the garage to see what he had in his Great Stash. We used to have, till it died, a metal clothes drying rack like this...

When it collapsed beyond repair, Bob used his bolt croppers to cut the metal rods into re-usable pieces.

He took one of these, fixed a bit of old broom handle to the end - and voila! we now have a poker. And it works.

We think we have found a solution for our crumpet dilemma - once the helpful lady at Cozy Stoves contacts us to say they are in stock, we shall have a toasting fork too!

Yes, you can buy TFs through the internet - but by buying it from her, we pay the same basic price, do not have delivery charges- and we help a local business. Win-win all round.