Knice guy

Once upon a time there were two little boys who liked to play with knives. Everywhere they went they brought along their trusted pocket knives and brandished them at every opportunity. They saw a great many things with their knives as companions, but now they had come across something special, something new. They had stumbled upon a flyer depicting the ancient and sacred art of knife making, on it was written in big red letters: "Make your own knife!"
This had the boys bubbling with excitement and they knew they couldn't resist the pamphlet's hypnotic charm. For many nights they laid awake dreaming of the knife they would make and how it would be the best knife in the world. And then, finally, the time had come!
They had to wake up early, really early "but waking up at 8:15 was worth it if you got to make your own knife!" thought the boys.
As they were still finishing their morning routine they were approached by a woman, "Are you two the ones making your own knives today?" she asked. "Yes, that's us" the boys replied as they dropped everything they were doing and hurried to the woman's car.
The car was old and dusty with an equally old and dusty dog (but not any less cute) sitting in the back seat. "Don't mind the dog" the woman said "He's old and deaf, but very friendly." The boys didn't mind. What one of the boys did find strange however was the fact that a large slab of rock was sitting on the floor of the car, but he didn't dwell on this for very long. After all, it was almost time to start making knives!
20 Minutes later the boys arrived at an old farm house with a forge outside and a whole bunch of anvils scattered around. There were a lot more people standing there, waiting just as anxiously as the boys for their chance to make knives. The woman's husband was standing in the middle of the group of people making smalltalk while he waited for everyone to arrive. He was wearing a brown blacksmith's apron and looked quite old with his grey hair and over sized glasses, but he sounded quite friendly. "Right" he said as he saw that everyone was here "If you'll follow me to those chairs we'll give you all a shirt and a pair of glasses to wear." The man walked almost like a penguin, without bending his knees, and the little boy wondered what was wrong with him. "Maybe he has two wooden legs" he thought. He was handed one of the ugliest shirts on earth and a pair of safety glasses to put on and a piece of tape that would serve as a name tag. Suddenly the boy noticed that the old man and woman were also wearing name tags and that they were in fact called "Steven" and "Robyn".
After leading the group back to the forge Steven gave some instructions on what was to be done to make a knife from a blank piece of steel. He gave everyone their very own piece of steel to work with and fired up the forge.
"We're going to stick our metal into the forge until it's red hot, being very careful not to take it too far, because that will ruin the metal" Steven said. "Now, could I borrow your steel for a second there Rob?" he asked as he took Rob's piece of metal and stuck it in the forge. "Do you see how Rob holds his metal straight as he pushes it into the forge, checking every now and then if his metal is the right colour?
"Beautifully done Rob, you did that perfectly" he said as he gave Rob back his piece of metal. "It's almost as if you've done that before!"
"The trick to hammering your metal into the right shape is to hammer it while it's hot and to hit it with the centre of your hammer, not the edges"
As Steven was giving these instructions the little boy was getting more nervous by the second. "What if I mess it up and ruin my blade!" he thought. Luckily, he didn't have to go first. After seeing 4 people do their parts before him he felt a little more confident, even if he would mess it up slightly, Steven would be able to fix it without problems.
Very carefully he stuck his piece of steel in the forge making sure to check on it regularly to see if it showed that bright orange glow yet. When it finally turned orange he quickly pulled it out of the forge and onto the anvil. He started to hammer and hammer as if his life depended on it, making very sure to hit it with the centre of the hammer only. The hammer rained down in loud ringing bangs as at least half of the blows hit the anvil instead of the blade. Not because the boy couldn't aim, but because he was being a little over-cautious to hit exactly the right spot on the blade.
After a while he stuck the blade back in the forge till it turned orange and then banged away to heart's content. Soon his blows were getting less frequent and sweat was starting to form on his brown, he was getting tired. "You can just put your hammer down and take a breather if you want" said Robyn, and so the boy did. He decided this was a good time to ask the expert's opinion on his progress and called over to Steven. Steven shuffled over, picked up the blade and said "Good job there Tim, looks like this one is done!" and he proceeded to hammer a curve in it for the handle to go on.
A little perplexed the boy said thanks and walked to put his blade in the bucket of water, he had thought he was only about halfway through hammering his metal. Afterwards Robyn stripped the metal grip off the blade and gave it back to the boy, saying he should start grinding the side of it on 4 different belt grinders. After using the first grinder he saw the metal turning bright, but he didn't notice any difference on the other grinders. Nevertheless he did what he was told and soon found himself standing with a slightly blade shaped piece of metal with a shiny centre part.
"The reason we grinded the centre" Steven said "Was because this makes it easier for the brass decoration to stick to the blade."
He then told everyone to glue two pieces of brass to either side of their blade and then drill two holes all the way through. After some more glue they inserted some brass pins and hammer them until the brass was fitted into place. Then they had to cut the handles out of a piece of wood and glue them onto the blade as well. Some more brass pins ensured that the wood was secure. After everyone had their handle glued to the metal Steven explained the group how they had to finish their handle before lunch. After everyone had their wood grinded down to roughly handle shape they were told to fill all the gaps with epoxy resin as fast as possible. "Especially the back crack!"
Then it was time for lunch and the boys feasted on their first cheese sandwich in what seemed like ages. After everyone went back for seconds and the dog finally decided he wouldn't be able to get any more food the group went for a walk. During this walk one boy remarked to the other "I wonder if we're going anywhere specific or if we're just going to walk the dog as a group" the other boy wondered exactly the same.
After the "walk" they went to the super swing. The super swing was a huge contraption and looked rather intimidating. "Why don't you go first Tim." Robyn said. The little boy complied and sat on the swing as five men were grabbing hold of the rope attached to it. At Robyn's mark they all ran backwards and pulled on the rope as hard as they could. The little boy went higher and higher and the ground got farther and farther away. Just before the people on the ground released the rope he felt like he was hanging horizontally and then went soaring down at high speed. Afterwards it was time for the other little boy to ride the swing and he too was impressed by the height he reached. None of the others seemed keen on riding the swing so they went back to the house where the boys passed the rest of the time by throwing axes and metal stars at a huge wooden target.
When Steven was done grinding off the excess metal off everyone's knife (this was too dangerous for the people to do themselves) the people collected their knives again. This time they were told to grind the blade down ever so slightly on a number of different grinders to achieve a mirror like polish. When everyone was done on the grinders they were told to go out to the front of the house where a number of chairs was waiting for them. Here they were to grind down the last blemishes off the blade manually using different grains of sandpaper.
As everyone was sitting there grinding away at their blade, looking out over the sea the little boy remarked to his friend "I imagine this is what it must have been like for people that got sent to sea to recover in the old days. Though I imagine their activities were a little less lethal"
Finally when all the blades were shining Steven lead them back to the other side of the house. "Just a final layer for the handle and we'll be having champagne!" he said as he showed the group how to cover their handle with a waterproof finish.
After everyone was done the group went inside and waited for their glass of champagne. As Robyn brought out a big tray filled with wine glasses Steven confessed to a secret: "It's not really champagne he said, it's made here on the westcoast. We call it berrypagne." As someone remarked that it tasted quite good he said "Thanks! We actually make it ourselves. What vintage is this dear?" he asked Robyn "I think this is the 2:30 vintage"
"There you go" Steven said "It's had about 1,5 hours to mature in the plastic bottle, which is important! You see, what we do is: We carefully select a bottle of wine from the local store (the cheapest one) and... well looking at that soda machine bottle you can probably guess the rest!"
Everyone laughed at this and finished their glass. The two boys were really starting to feel the effects of the alcohol and being very careful not to stab anyone with their brand new knife they joined the rest for a group photo outside.
Feeling slightly tipsy they thanked Steven and Robyn for a wonderful day and headed back with a huge smile on their face and their very own knives in their hand.