As the leaves of the Japanese maples once again began change to bright red in the crisp fall air, Tomboyama Nihontō Tanren Dōjō began winding up the 2010 school year.

In September, we hosted a Basic Forging Course and Oroshigane Seminar. Athanasios, the student who attended both, traveled from Athens, Greece to participate in our classes here at Tomboyama. Because of the difficulty of making such long distance travel arrangements, we were happy to schedule a special session of our Oroshigane Seminar for our Greek pupil as well. After returning to Greece, Athanasios has been busy setting up his own shop and has begun a swordsmithing blog, “Gaijintō”.

A specially scheduled Tsuka-maki (Handle-wrapping) Course was added in October. Our student, Thomas, learned and practiced the art of tsuka-maki by rewrapping the handle of his “dōjō cutting sword” with nice black silk ito.

We finished up the school year with the final of Basic Forging Course last week, November 1-5. Two students, Chip and Fred, attended the class, which was a later addition to this years schedule.

And now as the weather becomes colder and the rain more constant, Tomboyama now closes its doors for 2010. Winter storms can make travel arrangements problematic for students, many of which travel in from out-of-state. The winter break from classes also allows us to catch up with our own demanding workload.

If prospective students would like to make recommendations as to preferred dates for next years courses , we will happily take them into consideration as we now prepare for the schedule for the 2011 school year. The schedule for 2011 school year classes should be posted here online within a month.

We are looking forward the 2011 school year!