My name is Philip van der Wel: husband to Talia Christine van der Wel, and papa to Audrey Eleanor van der Wel. I love them with all of my heart, particularly Talia.
Introductions aside, I make no claims to be a carpenter in any sense of the word. I do, however, love to work with wood. Six or so months ago I decided to fashion some wooden playing blocks for Audrey; like the ones I, and so many of you I am sure, played with as children.
I searched through my meagre timber collection and found a few bedraggled posts I had previously collected from a neighbor's landfill-bound trailer, which looked to be the right dimension for blocks.
I took to them with 80 grit sandpaper and was pleased to find a beautiful grain beneath the weathered moss-covered exterior.
I decided on lengths (four times the width, three times the width, and so forth), cut each to size, and rounded the corners. You will notice I
I was happy so far, and tempted to keep them al naturale. I decided to let our daughter be the judge, and placed her amongst the blocks.
Her initial confusion turned to elation, and then quickly to disinterest (or rather re-interest in whatever else was within her reach).
In the end I did color them. I mixed green, yellow, red, and blue food dye with boiling water (in separate containers), soaked the blocks for ten minutes or so, and let them dry over the next few days. We were a little worried about the color leaching onto our offspring and their (future tense) clothing but thankfully our worries were not realized.
Colored wooden playing blocks.
Fin.
Thank you all for taking the time to read my first ever (multi-lingual) blog post. I am going to make an effort to document more projects, big and small, so you'll be hearing from me now and again.
On a side note, Audrey rarely plays with her blocks. I take comfort in the aesthetic value they add to her toy corner.
Phil, the Husband
