Spring arrivals and departures

Spring departures: From David's hands to Brett and Kortnee
Their Touch Wood Wedding Rings ~

Purple heartwood and African Blackwood ring designs
with jade and malachite inlays

Springtime arrivals on the meadow include White crowned Sparrows, Ruby-Throated and Calliope Hummingbirds, Red Winged and Yellow headed Blackbirds, Robins, Swallows, Purple Finches and bluebirds.

And more Spring departures ~ these Touch Wood Ring designs:
Jen and Brent's Dark Hawaiian Koa wood rings

This Black Wood Ring with crossed spiraled inlays of Golden Koa
and a golden Koa interior; for Nicole

Ed's Black Walnut Wood Ring ~ a tapered wood ring
with crossed spiraled inlays of Ash

Juniper Heartwood rings for Debora and Keith

African Blackwood, Hawaiian Koa and
Juniper heart wood rings for Brittany and Derek

Amber and Kelsey's gently tapered Arbutus Wood Rings
inlaid with New Zealand Paua shell.

Dark and light Hawaiian Koa Wood rings
with Birch Wood interiors for Abby and Alex

And our newest arrivals ~ Evening Grosbeaks;
there are 5 couples here now.

Wooden Rings and a song of Spring.

This is where your Touch Wood Rings are 'born'.
It's where we work and live and play. If you haven't already; I invite you to visit our personal blog (The Homestone) for photos David and I take of every season, and the birds and animals who call this place home.
Spring is such a glorious time of year ~ anywhere it occurs ~ I can't resist sharing a few pics with you here, on our wood ring blog! It's Spring on the meadow, Spring on Mackin Pond.

It's the 21st of March and the willows are vibrant! Their reds and oranges and browns bursting with catkins. Here is a tiny Touch Wood Ring (Size 3.5) made of willow with inlays of rosewood and grayed maple. (This willow wood ring was designed by and created for Stephanie.)


It's a beautiful thing ~ this explosion of pussy willows and the return of our feathered friends. Already there are well over a hundred Red Winged Blackbirds and the 'girls' have yet to arrive. The male Blackbirds melodic conversations are mesmerizing.


Surrounded by the ever changing beauty of nature as we are; it would be impossible not to be inspired by it.
Here are a few of David's latest Touch Wood Ring creations.

Rosewood Rings with inlaid quartz, commissioned by and created for Denise and Brent.

Grayed maple wood rings with Australian Blackwood ~ designed by and created for Colin and Leigh.


Dark Hawaiian Koa Wood Rings with Oak inlays.
Australian Red Gum Wood Ring with a Maple wood liner and an inlay of Malachite.
A tapered Juniper heartwood Ring with a Koa Wood Liner and a Grayed Maple Wood ring with Hawaiian Koa inlay.
An African Black Wood ring set with golden koa bordering an inlay of Malachite and Azurite.
While we were away this month visiting family in the Similkameen Valley, David got another large piece of beautiful Juniper heartwood from his brother Sid.

Here is another example of a Touch Wood Ring (for Naomi) made of Juniper heartwood.

And with that, it's time to get back to my emails and all the folks we have the honour and privilege of working with. Thanks for dropping by and thanks for your patience while we took some time away. Till next time ~ be well and enjoy a moment or two of the blackbirds in concert on a little spit we call the island.

Five Rings made of BC woods.

With the arrival of people from all over the world to British Columbia this month ~ I thought it would be fun to feature 5 Touch Wood Rings that incorporate BC woods or have a BC theme.

This set of rings was designed by a BC couple to represent the mountains around Pemberton. The primary wood is beautifully figured Bethlehem Olive wood. Their rings are lined with BC Birch wood.


The photograph above was taken on one of David's small handcrafted boxes. The box is made of reclaimed Bug Killed Pine from our own property. This is the same reclaimed wood that was used in the making of the Richmond Olympic Oval.

Our Juniper heartwood is from the Similkameen Valley of British Columbia. You'll find lots of examples of Touch Wood Rings made of and incorporating Juniper heartwood. Here are two examples.


And below; a BC Apple Wood Ring. This wood also comes from the Similkameen Valley of British Columbia.

Finally, a February sunset over the meadow where Touch Wood Rings are created.
Welcome to British Columbia.

A random gathering

Touch Wood Rings ~ a random gathering on a Sunday evening.

Ash Juniper and Mesquite Wood Rings. The mesquite was used as the interior wood in this set of rings. Ash juniper is the primary wood.


Classic Juniper heart wood rings ~ our juniper heartwood comes from David's brothers property in the Similkameen Valley of British Columbia. It's beautiful wood! Durable, and with so much variety in figure, grain and colour.

John and Whitney's black walnut ring design below and the lovely ring box they ordered from Al Ladd. We highly recommend Al's work if you are looking for a finely crafted and beautiful home for your Touch Wood Ring.


Dark Koa wood rings with inlays of Birds eye maple.
Hawaiian Koa wood ring with a single offset inlay of African Blackwood.
Mid toned Hawaiian Koa wood rings with three spiraled inlays of African Blackwood (Grenadilla), Ancient New Zealand Kauri and Maple wood.
Black Walnut wood rings with Birds Eye Maple liners

Classic Hawaiian Koa Wood Ring with a Eucalyptus liner
Juniper heartwood ring with a featured knot and a birch bark liner with natural birch bark markings. Out of curiosity and just for fun, I spent a few minutes on Google Translate and came up with these translations of our name;

Touch Wood Rings

• Vietnamese Touch Wood Nhẫn
• Ukaranian Сглазьте кільця
• Turkish Touch Ahşap Yüzükler
• Thai วง Touch ไม้
• Spanish Touch Wood Anillos
• Slovac Zaklopať na drevo Prstene
• Serbian Тоуцх дрвета прстенова
• Russian Сглазьте кольца
• Romanian Touch Wood Inele
• Portuguese Touch Wood Anéis
• Persian لمس چوب حلقهها
• Macedonian Допир Вуд прстените
• Latvian Touch Wood Gredzeni
• Korean teochi udeu banji
• Japanese tatchiuddoringu
• Irish Teagmháil Adhmad fáinní
• Hindi ṭaca vuḍa riṅgōṁ
• Hebrew טבעות Touch Wood
• French toucher des anneaux de bois

'Touch Wood Rings' in any language are sustainable made and meticulously hand crafted wooden rings.

Touch Wood Rings and Design decisions.

Every day brings delight; new inquires and old friends alike. Not having access to telephone on the meadow; we do all our communications by email. It's more time consuming than using a telephone but I find that it's a pretty cool way to get to know people.

I have a lot of fun talking with folks by email; answering questions and offering assistance with wood ring design ideas or chatting about sustainable living. We meet the most amazing people.

One couple was especially creative with their emails. One of Jamie's emails included this Photo shop mock up of Frank ‘thinking seriously’ about his wooden ring design. They were kind enough to let us share this image with you. Great Fun!! Thanks Jamie and Frank.

Touch Wood and Happy New Year

Welcome to our wooden ring blog on this bright New Years Eve day.

We wish you the very best that life has to offer in 2010 and beyond.

Just for fun; here's a scan of an old family treasure that is pasted in an heirloom autograph book. This is a New Years greeting card from 1873 ~ one of the first greeting cards ever made.


137 years later ~ here we are ~ able to talk to almost anyone from anywhere in an instant! Still with the same warm wishes for a healthy and happy new year.

I want to share a few photos and letters from some folks we've worked with in the last little while. We make so many friends through our work. T'is a wonderful thing.

Jenna and Amanda's Touch Wood Rings created in July 2009:

"The rings were such an important centerpiece to our ceremony. As promised (but long overdue) - here is a nice shot of the rings that you made for Amanda and I, set on our hand-fasting bands. This photo was taken by Blind Photography (Rebecca Hodges and Holleen Lawrence). The hand-fasting bands were woven by my Aunt Connie (Connie Elliott). She's a part of the Contemporary Hand-weavers of Houston guild. Thank you again, we are loving our 'touch wood rings'."
-JennaDavid created a set of braided wood rings in August 2007 and in late November this year we received a lovely email from our old friends Wendy and Marlon.

Hi there Nicola and David We hope you are both well. This is Wendy and Marlon from Golden. You made our beautiful rings for us in 2007. I was just wondering if you had a facebook page? I think it would be a great idea for you to promote your beautiful work on there. I have recently sent a link to your website to all my friends. Our rings are still very beautiful and mean so much to us - one day we may come out to visit you up there in Williams Lake as we have relatives out that way, it would be great to meet you. Take care and kind regards Wendy and Marlon


Here's another recent email from old friends; Clyde and Ashley.

Hello again, I realize it's been more than two years since you've heard from us, but we finally got around to getting engaged (July of 2008), and married last month. It was a pretty long engagement, I suppose. I just wanted to thank you again. I think I may have asked you not to post pictures of our rings so we couldn't have been sneaking a peak ahead of time. Obviously, you can show off our lovely rings now. Thank you for doing what you do. The rings speak a great deal for our general sentiment, and the number of compliments we've received about them is tremendous. Thank you, Clyde and Ashley

This beautiful design was commissioned in November of 09 ~ here is what David wrote after he received his ring.

Hello Nicola and David, We received the ring, and it exceeded our expectations! Maritess and I went to a Thai Vegan restaurant to celebrate the arrival of the ring, and had agreed not to open the package until we arrived at the restaurant. I'm so glad we waited. We loved the presentation of the ring! The ring itself...was beautiful! There are so many details which cannot be picked up by a camera that complete the ring. Thank you very much. It's put a smile on both of our faces, and we will definitely recommend you to others as the first place to look for a ring for this very special time in their lives. Thank you so much! Sincerely, David and Maritess

Thank you so much to everyone who contacts us, thanks to all the folks who work with us and thanks to those who visit our website and blogs and haven't yet been in touch. We look forward to meeting you and welcome the opportunity to work with you in the future.
With our love and our very best wishes!
Happy New Year.
Warmly, Nicola and David.