The Kawa Bonsai Club’s, Joy of Bonsai will be held in January and they are lining up a competition for those that participated in the Tokonoma building class last year. All of those that took the class can bring back their Tokonoma with a display set up to compete against each other. Sounds like fun.

Here’s the group from last year in a Photoshop project I did. If you haven’t seen these little displays, you really need to. They are really something special.

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Today I was able to finish up the Zen garden that I have been working on. It was really just the detail left, and adding more bamboo to the fence that I had started last time.

I added horizontal poles in between the ones that were there from the initial build. It just looked too weak before so I wanted to beef up the look of the screen. I think it really worked and made it look just so much better. I’m really happy with it.

The blisters from last week were almost gone, however I certainly noticed them as I made 16 more lashings .

Here’s another close up of one of the many lashings I used. I was really getting good at them by the end of this project.

So all that is left is just to relax and enjoy. Finally some Zen…

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So I continued working on the Zen garden today. I had one thing in mind, construct the bamboo screen. The purpose of the screen is to do nothing more than stop the eye from looking at the door behind it.

I wanted to make the screen look authentic so I didn’t use any screws. This entire fence was constructed using lashings. I haven’t done this since my Boy Scout days, but somethings you never forget. Here is a close up of one of the 63 lashings. Needless to say I had just about as many blisters.

From here you can see the door behind the screen that I was trying to distract from. I think it worked, and the light bamboo color compliments the green on the walls and the natural bamboo growing right next to it.

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Okay I can’t get enough of making daiza. It is just amazing to me to start with a block of wood and then transform it into a flowing piece of furniture. I just love it. Well I wanted to show how my last daiza turned out, and show what else I have been working on.

Here it is after a light coat of SPAR Urethane. It really brings out the beautiful color of the Bolivian Rosewood.

A member of the Central Florida Bonsai Club asked if I could make a daiza for one of his rocks. I of course agreed because I wanted to practice. This was a little more difficult because the bottom of the rock was not flat.

Sometimes I loose site of the daiza and just enjoy the entire Suiseki (rock & daiza). Here is close up of the daiza. Notice how much carving I had to do inside of it to get the rock to sit flat. Too bad this portion is covered, it is rarely ever seen.

Here is the group of the daiza that I have made so far. They don’t take all that long to make, and are really enjoyable.

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