This Christmas, I whiled away (some of) the time by constructing a couple of model mills from Woodcraft, both purchased on impulse during a visit to the Town Mill in Lyme Regis a couple of weekends before Christmas. The kits are tagged as not suitable for children under 3 years of age because of the small parts, but I suspect that children under 10 could have trouble because of the complexity of some stages of the construction (particularly the wind mill) and the need to sand and file some of the parts to get them to fit (particularly the wind mill's moveable cap). Althought the kit instructions suggest that wood glue isn't needed because the parts should fit snugly together, this was true in only some instances; in others, such as the legs for the water mill, it was necessary to leave them to set overnight before final assembly.

Here are some photographs of the results, from the kits in their packs through stages in their construction to the finished models.