Needles You Say?

I can’t believe how fast this month has flown by! We’ve been experiencing amazing fall weather which has swung between stunning sunshine and the damp misty fog I envision when thinking of the first views our Vikings would have seen of Northern Scotland and the British Isles.

During our initial stages of planning for this nalbinding adventure, we decided we were going to try our hand at making our own needles. After researching the needles online through re-enactor sites, I found a crafter, Deanna, in Ontario who sells handcrafted nalbinding needles through her shop Chesnut Tree Creations. After using these as inspiration, we decided to try and make a needle from wood. We contacted a local woodworker who was kind enough to help us with our project including helping us handle the tools safely. Thanks Dad!  We gathered the materials required and got to work on Monday night. 

We tried to use tools that would not have had realistic results based on the tools the Vikings would have had access to. This includes an axe, a hand saw, a pocket-knife, files, screws/nails and sandpaper. We know similar tools existed due to The Mastermyr Find and we were amazed at how simple the process actually was. 

Kelsey's mad axe skills

We started out using a smallish piece of BC softwood (pine or cedar), and using the axe, split it into smaller slices. These were split again into rectangles and then carved or whittled down into the rough needle shape using the pocket-knife and then smoothed it all out with the sand paper. Once it was in the almost finished state, we then “cheated” and used a power drill to create an eye. This unfortunately caused the wood to split leaving us to start over. Trial and error!

After repeating the process up to the rough needle shape, we then re-drilled the eye and once it reached the desired size and shape, we finished sanding it. This whole process took about 7 minutes the second time! We created a few more and are very pleased with how they have turned out. We know the modern use of a drill reduced the overall amount of time required to create a needle, but with a sharpened tool such as a tiny chisel or boring tool, it could still become an incredibly fast item to produce. Of course the right woodworker's skills would be a welcome asset! 

Stay tuned over the next few days to see samples of all of the amazing needles we have made! Stay classy nalbinders, and thanks for stopping in! -TK