Hello!
My name is Andrea, and I am originally from the southwest suburbs of Chicago, IL. I am now attending college in Montana and loving every minute of it. I've loved archery ever since about the 5th grade. I was quite into the "Redwall" series by Brian Jacques, so swords and bows and the like were all fresh in my imagination. One day, I was locked out of my house (forgot my house key) and had a while before my parents got home, so I decided to try and make a bow. I found a skinny little sapling growing off the base of a tree by the shed in the back and cut it down with an old steak knife that was my whittling/project knife I kept in the backward. I cut some nocks very roughly and found an old nylon string to tie to each end of the sapling, found a reasonably straight stick and carved a nock into it, and discovered with great delight that my silly little bow actually launched the stick partway across the yard! With the exhilaration of seeing that first "arrow" fly, I was hooked. So my bow-building operation expanded that summer (and some following summers) to cutting down black willow of a diameter close to what I wanted my bow to be. I would strip off the bark, whittle down the thick end (using a handy lockback pocket knife my father gave to me, which I still have and use) to match the skinny end so they bent pretty similarly, glue a spiral wrapping of leather around the handle, and call it a bow! I would make single-fletch arrows by splitting dowel rods or straight sticks at one end, smashing the quill of a goose feather flat, wedging it in, and wrapping the shaft on either side of the feather. The points were all just whittled sharp.
I now hear that willow makes a terrible bow. In fact, I'm sure the bows I made drew between 5 and 10 pounds, took a fair amount of set, and had a shamefully lopsided tiller. But I sure do miss the joy of the time and care spent making them. Unfortunately, I had a falling-out with my best friend at the time, and when she decided she didn't want me as a friend anymore, she took all my archery tackle with her. Which is extremely depressing, since I was the only one who ever put any sincere effort into building all the bows, arrows, staffs, shields, and wooden swords that went into our pretend games (which were quite fun when we got all of the little neighbor kids to join as the enemy army).
Despite all the silliness, the love of archery was planted in me permanently. I took a four-year break from it, but now that I'm in college and I have all this spare time, I just can't stay away any longer. Right now I'm building a Plains-style osage shortbow, learning how to twist flemish, learning how to embroider with quills, and making arrowheads with a dremel tool from cow bone. This is pretty much the coolest hobby, ever.
