Everyone is asking, Have you lost interest in Woodooz ? Have we ?

I have to accept. 2014 was not a great year for Woodooz in terms of the number of posts and projects. Compared to the previous year, the count is paltry – A mere 18. Not even two posts a month and the blog has been dormant, if not dead, for the last 3 months.  And this is making many ask me, “Are you done with it? Have you lost interest? Is this not a sustainable hobby? “.

A 2014 project - Side Table

Before I answer that question, I wanted to look back at 2014. Despite few posts, we had some interesting things happening at Woodooz:

• First was the coverage in Smartlife Magazine. This gave us a big motivational boost.
• Second was my visit to the Bosch DIY Square in Bangalore. Woodworking is fun and to experience it in a proper studio kind of environment was very exciting for me.
• Third was meeting up with a fellow woodworker. It was an evening well spent talking about not just carpentry, but also about life in general.
• And lastly, a lovely vacation to end the year. To be lazy and do absolutely nothing was the objective of the holiday and Kumarakom ended up being the perfect destination for it.

 At the banks of Kumarakom Vembanad lake

All good things ? Yet there was a dearth of posts. Why ? Have I lost interest ? Has the passion died ?

The truth is, there have been too many activities in the last 3 months that have been taking my attention. Activities that I have started to enjoy and pursue as parallel hobbies that I ended up giving very little time to Woodworking.

Cricket

To start with, I have taken to Cricket every Saturday morning. Not the professional sport types, but the tennis ball kinds that you play with friends. This I took up to introduce physical activity into my schedule to stay more fit and active. Much like every Indian, I love playing Cricket and now this takes up good 4 hours of my every Saturday.

Lots of action in the cricket ground

Photography

We recently bought a DSLR with absolutely no knowledge on using one. The prime reason was to start taking better pictures of our Woodooz projects. But then, what happened ? As I started exploring the camera and the basics around using it, I was involuntarily drawn into photography. A sudden surge that prompted me to go click click and click. The result – I have been spending way too much time in getting my techniques right. I love this so much that we have even started going bird watching to explore photography more.

Butterfly - Kumarakom Bird Sanctuary

Row of Park Benches

Spot Billed Pelican - At Pallikarnai Marsh Land

Reading

And finally reading. A collection of books that is supposedly epic novels written in my native language Tamil. I started reading the first in the series and realized how much I have been giving my mother tongue a step motherly treatment. These books written by Kalki Krishnamurthy are beautifully written novels that use fiction around real historical characters and events. What this did was not only unearth my interest in my language, but also in history. These books about the pallavas, and cholas are among the best that I have read in a long long time. And so, you can imagine. I still have another 5 parts to complete and I intend to be glued onto them.

Kalki's Ponniyin Selva collection

All said, what happens to Woodworking ? Had a little positive distraction in 2014 that made us give divided attention to Woodooz. However, we are resolute now to find all possible excuses to create newer projects that will keep us and Woodooz engaged throughout 2015. Which in turn only translates into providing you with quality updates, how tos, FAQs and other project updates at frequent intervals.

On that positive and forward looking note, we want to wrap up our 2014. We don't know what is in store for us in 2015. But the year that went by has certainly been enjoyable and exciting.

Wish you and your family a Happy and Prosperous New Year.