Goodbye Beautiful Workbench

Yesterday, in our last preparations for our big bike trip, I handed off all of my stuff to my dad for safe keeping. Including my beautiful workbench.


A few years ago, when I started working with metal, I asked my dad to build me a workbench for Christmas. I needed a space to work and I didn't like any of the overly-complicated benches I saw on Rio and I thought it would be great fun to work with my dad on this project (which it was). It's a beautiful piece of furniture - simple, solid oak - and I have loved every minute that I have had it.


But, it's heavy and big and doesn't really fit on a bike, so we took it apart and loaded it into my dad's car for him to take back to his house. I trust it'll be safe until we find ourselves at the end of this trip and I can claim it again and set up a new studio somewhere. I'm feeling fine about it this morning, but it was (honestly) really hard to say goodbye to it yesterday.

I sold my under-used bracelet mandrel to Nina Gibson from Etsy Metal, and when she came to pick it up, she told me she had no idea how I was going to do it. I've been very calm about all of this until yesterday when it all of a sudden became very real - and, now, I have no idea how I'm going to do it either. I guess that's a part of the process - and I still feel that it's something I really need in order to push myself in a new direction with my jewelry. But, wow, I am officially workbench-less now. How very very strange.

I am also torch-less. I decided not to bring the torch I have, because it has a long hose and I didn't want to chance any punctures while it's bumping around on the bike. Depending on how things play out, I might be in the market for a small and very portable torch.