Hearts on fire..... Of coarse if you leave these bowls on a 1,000 deg. surface they will be on fire. Roberta's opinion about the food colored bowls doesn't count any more. She will not open herself to wood that has been dyed. Speaking of dyed. A very good friend Bonnie Rike of 2 DYE 4 has just given me a little inspiration to create tie-dyed bowls.

The large red measures 8"x7"x2"($40) and the natural is 6"x6X"x2"($30).

Had to do a little more grinding on the Kutzall bit, but overall had good day(even did the dishes for momma after lunch).



Awww, now ain't them precious!



"Steal her heart with one of these". I Think that was a jewelery ad heard some few years back for a heart shaped diamond pendant. Diamonds are forever, but who sticks around that long. Go green, go wood it's cheaper and leaves a much smaller foot print(like baby socks). Think of all that money you will save!

The piece in the middle is a mini salt bowl to show size. All 6 are of maple. The 2 on the bottom right have not received their oil treatment yet. The one on the left was doused in red food coloring, very heartsie. The top right is a nice clean blond from the sap wood. There are 5 like that. The others have the heart wood and each very distinct. Their size measures 3.5"x3.5"x1.5" and cost $20 each.



One last shot. The doggy, 2 chairs and the kayak! All that and just $300 to get the bidding going!

di




Tool modification of the day yesterday was a Kutzall carbide bit 3/4" x 1" chucked up on a McCullah die grinder. Without change it's an aggressive wood removal tool with good precision and fairly clean cut. Now it just chews right in with a clean cut. It took a couple of hours, but that will be made up by reducing hundreds of hours removing wood.













This is such a pretty maple. The scoop to the left shows some nice fiddle back grain structure. There is a large crotch piece of this maple still in stock. Maybe I'll cut that up today along with the mountain walnut picked up last weekend.






Still waiting for a opening bid on the doggy. I'll even throw in the chairs where the couch used to be.

It was a mortar and pestle day yesterday, but before production could start there needed to be a little time invested in tool maintenance. This round was for the band saw blade that would barely cut. Time to use the trusty 18 year old Dremel rotary power tool with a diamond bit to sharpen each tooth. The first 12" out of 125" having 7 teeth per inch was fun to sharpen. To change a blade and tune the band saw takes at least half an hour($10 plus the cost of a new blade $20), so your better off learning how to sharpen your tools efficiently. The M&P's carved from hickory take 2 1/2 hours to create($50). Today will be 3 maple which should go faster.
It's the boss's first day back in the work force today. She'll remember the joys of highway travel especially with ice! She is looking forward to working with Jeff again which will make it all o.k.

Finally finished. It took over 400 years to make this bowl. Of coarse I only invested the last few hours. The white oak came out of Craig Co. VA. Tucked in the middle of a quaint valley between the Catawba and Fort Lewis mountain ranges. The tree fell mid-morning the same day as the V Tech shooting April, 2007 in a strong wind storm whipping up the valley. There are over 84 growth rings counted on this piece.
What's amazing is that it's actually just a branch from the upper part of the tree approximately 22"-26" in diameter. That's Dale a good friend and owner of the bowl. This picture should give you a visual idea of the enormity of the tree. The very base took up a 9' circle while at head height about a 5' girth. The inside heartwood had been consumed by ants leaving a 24"x5' space I could easily slip into and stand up in. The log in the lower left of the picture is the piece the bowl is made from.

It was a pleasure meeting 2 fellow woodworkers yesterday. Jim and Don your both always welcome to visit anytime.

The Boss is now liquidating our assets. She sold the couch and love seat! What's next our little doggy(I'll take $300 for an opening bid). There are two theories to arguing with women. Neither one works. Now she'll spend a month looking for 2 big armed chairs. It also means that a cheap purse is on the back burner and pricey chairs are in her sights. The quickest way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.
I just made the mistake of reading this out loud and her reply was if you sell my dog I'll **** *** *** *** ** ***.

Just received an e-mail about what to use for treating a wood spoon. Figure I should post what I wrote in case there are some out there that are not sure what to do. The question asked really pertains to a spoon he carved himself, however this is information that you can apply to any wooden product that is unfinished. One more note, not all woods are the same as far as the application amounts of oil. Softer, less dense woods will absorb more oil whereas hard/dense wood will absorb less.

"Definitely use mineral oil from the store. Apply it heavy 3 or 4 times letting it sit and soak a day for each application. After that wash it with hot water and soap then towel dry. You'll notice that the grain has risen causing it to feel rough. Use 320 grit sandpaper to smooth it and apply more oil. I have found that maple needs 2 to 3 washing/sanding/oil till the grain no longer rises unless it's been used a lot and just needs oil."

What a weekend get away. A new friend invited me to his mountain retreat(in process) to hike and just relax. Well it was relaxing work just to keep warm. Fortunately There close to the shed that has a wood stove was a dying walnut tree. We kept warm from the limbs and he gets a bowl from the 4 logs brought back. Deep in his back yard we followed the river up to see beautiful falls in stages. Around every bend there was a new and more amazing site to see. Sunday morn was a wee bit chilly hoovering around 12 degrees. The best way to warm up is to move 4 loads of 150 pounds of wood in a cart up a steep incline. You can some what get an idea of the slope left of the shed.

Not to shabby for 28 hours of fun. There are 4 mini's and 6 spoons out of maple to the left. The rest are hickory.











Roberta was so thoughtful of me for Christmas. She bought the GOOD disposable razor heads instead of the painful variety($5 per bakers dozen). They dazzled her eye and she painfully paid $15 and tossed them in my stocking not realizing they would not fit my handle. No problem. Of course, what wood carver has time to go to the store when he's in the shop carving a handle out of cherry for his new disposable razor heads .

After taking a little time(which is not to often there is any extra laying around) and measuring the radius's of the tools I determined that the mini spoons and bowls(salt cellars) needed to be a little larger. Both the length and spoon head are much easier to create and finish at this size. They may not be as cute but the price will be at $20 for a set. The bowls are about 2.50" wide and 3.75" long. The depth of the bowls vary from .75 "to 1.25".
Happy Birthday Tucker. Hope you like and use your bowl. Be sure to thank Roberta. It was her idea to make you a football bowl.

It looks like the Boss will be resigning from her position. Yep she's going to go back into the work force. Looks like trying to get her employee to get some work done was a little overwhelming. She also has her eye on a cheap purse.
Due to the cold weather and swinging a hammer(not having time to cut fresh wood) I rummaged around the shop for slabs of crotch and burl set aside for special projects. You already saw the walnut crotch so here is some nice cherry. The pestle has a pretty spot of burl on one end. Mortar and pestle are$40 and should have more made up from that tough hickory.











Friday night the boss had full control of the TV(free HBO and Cine. chick flic weekend). So it's in the shop to play. Last summer I really enjoyed hand carving little snake spoons at the Markets. They take about an hour to make. Cherry is the best to use because the grain is so tight and you can get pieces very thin with out breaking.

Crotch Walnut...... Pictures do not show the true beauty of the grain. This scoop was designed with a flat end to be able to scrape the bottom of the pot to get the last bit. It can serve a whooping 1o oz. of soup. Instead of ladling 3 times you can fill your bowl with just one scoop.

Well,,,, It happened yesterday. Started swinging the hammer doing some trim in an old 2 story garage. Nothing plum or level according to the law of physics. They have been waiting a year to get this done. This will take some time. Time that will be scarce. Exactly 3 weeks before a planned show in Brooksville FL. and the need to be making bowls. Remembering the stress at the age of 30 that was brought on by the urge to carve and the need to actually make money. Things are different now. Having a little more patience and a little more scheduling skills. Get into the shop early for a few hours then off to swinging. Actually that stress that I had then was intenseified by not having a market to sell my carvings. With out a marketable product to boot. Having quit construction and spending 3 days at Kiptopeke State Park to figure out what the heck is going on. Looking back it is amazing to see how doors were opened. On leaving the park the Ranger asked about my stay. When told about being a carver he invited me to come back in a month and sell carvings at a 2 day event(wow). Got back home went to Woodcraft to get supplies for bird carving and was asked to teach classes and work there part time(wow). These events could be veiwed as just happenings, but my expeirience was much more than happenings. Three days of pain, did that really have to happen to get to today? One day of life changing happenings, how about that. Spent three days of painfull prayer only asking what to do.

Made a vain attempt to carve 30 spreaders yesterday. 22 finished with 11 more almost there. In the middle of production had a tool breakdown. It never fails to happen right when your in your groove. Cranked up bluegrass blaring and fully focused on where my fingers are in relation to the grinder(that will give you a nasty rash very quickly). When you run a tool for
hundreds of hours under stress within a few months it's more than it can handle. The poor grinder got it's brushes replaced just 2 months ago! which should last a year. The disease "tool breakdown" in production work should always be added in the time per piece before you start your project if you do this for a living. I however, did not do this. Thinking oh, these can be done in a day. Needless to say it was a long 9am to 7pm $110 production day. Any body out there live on $110 a day?
You may notice that sets of 3,4,5 look quite similar. If you cut the top profile out of a thicker piece then slice off to the right thickness you can reduce your time cutting out each individual piece thus saving time. I still wound up with an average of 25 minutes per piece. Selling the spreaders for $5 each will not get momma a cheap purse.

Hey all, Having a happy New Year yet? Things have slowed down to a comfortable pace now. I feel like I can make some fun(different) stuff. Still have to get into production work but not right away. Some types of pieces Like this little cherry(5x8x1.5 $40) take more time to create which are nice but also take longer to sell and this poor boy has a hungry little mouth to feed plus momma needs another purse. Really, Lillie(dog) only weighs 8lbs. and momma just bought a cheap purse(for her vast collection). Last week was good for spoons and salt cellars. What do you think of the short handle ladle/scoop?








Carved up these large maples(18x12x5 $100 each) two weeks ago. Pretty sure they are ready to go. Each had a crack in the end grain which are now closed tight. They are also the last of the red maple from my back yard. Having received five maple trees from different areas over the years each look so distinct.

Hope everyone is having a Happy New Year so far. As you can see Daisey had a little to much hooch to drink.




I carved up this Carolina wren for a friends mother as a Christmas gift. It's been a few years since any bird carving has happened out in the shop. Really enjoyed making it and think I'll make some more of other birds sticking their heads out of a chunk of wood.