I saved these turnings to post on Easter. The bowl was my first turning project and is poplar with stain and polyurethane finish. The eggs were skill building pieces as I learned not to harm myself with a skew chisel. From largest to smallest they are ash, a manufactured multicolored blank, jatoba and zebrawood. The eggs were finished on the lathe with shellac, no stain.

At some point I will have to make a larger (8” or so) sphere to roll around the house and scare the dog. Happy Easter to all.

I was scrounging through my wood scraps where I keep pieces too nice to throw out but not big enough for a whole project. I had a piece of birsdeye maple and a small square of paduak that looked good together, so I cut the maple into 4 squares and glued them up, and turned the paduak into a circle and glued that to the maple to form a turning block.

Finished with shellac, this small turning is pleasing and makes an attractive knick-knack.

This is a small turned bowl (about 4-5”) but the contrast between the sapwood and heartwood make a striking design feature. The grain is very attractive. This wood was enjoyable to turn and finished quite nicely with shellac applied on the lathe.

This bloodwood bowl uses a brass ikebana (Japanese art of flower arrangement) insert that is water tight. There are spikes inside that hold the cut flowers upright. I made it as a Christmas gift for my wife, and it is her skill at flower arrangement that makes the piece “pop”.

I thought (stupid me) that it would be an easy piece to complete, but there was some stubborn end-grain tear out that kept me working at it for some additional hours. Scary sharp tools and all available sandpaper grits finally resulted in a nice finish.

The bowl is only hollowed out for the insert, but the additional heft keeps the center of gravity low.

This is another of my early efforts at bowl making. The outward turning lip makes the bowl look larger than it is, and the contrasting wood of the spindle adds visual interest. The bowl base is lacewood and the spindle is bloodwood. The spindle is attached with a hidden dowel for strength. It was also a way to practice spindle work and bowl making simultaneously.

There was a practical reason to use a different wood for the spindle – I was able to get more height to the piece than is possible from a 2×5” square blank.

This piece can find use as a small snack bowl or the inevitable knick-knact collector.

Here is a small bowl (approx. 4” in dia.) made from a laminated blank I purchased. The woods were not identified in the blank but it looks like yellowheart, bloodwood (or maybe bubinga), possibly oak and then walnut at the center.

I enjoy detailing the bottom even though it may not be seen by the casual observer. I think that is a holdover from my time as a kick-wheel potter. At craft fairs when looking at the pottery I will often examine the bottoms because you can easily tell the true crafts people.

My goal is to work up to laminated bowls but I would hate to do an elaborate glue up just to ruin the piece through lack of experience.

I’ve recently taken up woodturning and I’m learning my way, with plenty of “learning experiences” that have ended up as scrap. Here is one of my first ‘keepers’, a small mortar bowl and lid made from a laminated blank of maple sandwiched by cherry, with a walnut pestle.

I particularly like the natural dark streak in the maple that enhances the craft look to the bowl. Finished with shellac.

It is the right size for grinding up small amounts of herbs etc when I am doing prep chef duty.

The base to our California King size bed as it came from the store was black painted particle board. I finally found the time to make a replacement base that offers four big drawers for storing linens and what-not in what was wasted space. The design I used matches the bed frame and other furniture in the room.

The construction is a combination of red oak lumber with red oak plywood to lighten the frame and save a little $. The drawers are slide mounted with heavy duty slides for ease of use. The finish is Honey Oak stain and satin polyurethane.

I am drawn to the arts and crafts style of furniture design and construction. Here is a blanket rack for the family room that gives us a place to store and display homemade blankets and throws when the irregular urge to tidy up hits us.

The technical part I enjoyed was the through-tenons on the horizontal pieces and the use of 5/4” red oak that gives some heft to the piece that is lacking with the usual 3/4” wood from the big-box stores. Stained with Honey Oak and protected with a few coats of satin polyurethane to match the room.

Scrollsawn picture frame, walnut over maple. A little fancy for some tastes. It doesn’t hurt that it frames my favorite grandsons either.

This is a painted cedar birdhouse for purple martins that I have had up for 4 years. It has held up quite well.

It is installed faceing backwards on a driveway basketball hoop that was underutilized (my lay-ups are more virtual than actual these days) and then raised. The second picture shows it in the lowered position.

For purple martins a requirement is to clean out the nest boxes every season and more frequently if invasive species try to nest. The problem I have is the mechanism that attaches the diagonal arm to the post is not easy to raise and lower – see third photo. Any ideas how to improve this mechanism?

Your ideas and comments are welcome.

-Lew

This is a trellis for a honeysuckle vine that has been installed for 3 years. As you can see the unfinished cedar has weathered nicely, although I had to take it down this year to refasten some of the lap joints with screws – the Titebond III glue used in the initial construction did fail after a time, although it is advertised as water resistant.

This is another quick project that can add an attractive and useful accessory to your office without a lot of effort. This project started as a piece of 1/2” oak board that I had to cut off from another project due to the large “defect”. I enjoy looking at these unique pieces of wood “snake-eyed” to see what hidden beauty could be unlocked.

With some freehand scrollsaw work, the image of a wind-swept tree clinging to some desolate shore was evoked, and enhanced by the natural darker brown shades in the grain.

I also enjoyed that a potential cast off piece of wood could be saved – it is a good conversation starter as well.

This is an excellent week-end project now that the Super Bowl has run its course – taco holders. Plans for this come from Wood magazine Dec-Jan 2005 issue. The uprights are from maple, the base from cherry, and walnut dowels through the end pieces add interesting contrast. It’s a fun project and makes good gifts for friend and family.

Holds your fixin’s in place!

When you have a basement shop as I do, it is always great when you can fill three needs at once. This project, built from plans in one of the woodworking magazines, provides plenty of individual bins to separate the myriad types of screws, nuts, bolts and other miscellaneous hardware that we collect in the course of different projects and home repairs. Two shelf cases are stacked and each case can hold either 6 single height drawers or 3 double height. My project has 6 single height drawers (21 bins each) above, 4 single and 1 double height drawer on the bottom. The drawer pulls were routed with an inset slot for labels.

One modification to the plans I made was to install the top with 4 screw levelers in the corners and using 1/4” HDPE to cover the top. This, with the lockable casters used on the bottom, allows the shelf unit to double as a table saw infeed or outfeed table. The HDPE provides a reduced friction surfact that wood slides on pretty well.

The third use is that which is always in short supply – bench space!

These three projects occupy a place of honor in our front hall. The arts and crafts cabinet probably has a formal name but we just call it “the hall thingie”. It is great for keys, telephone books, and to drop the mail on.

The lamp complements the arts and crafts theme and was a fun project. The lampshade is mica for heat resistance. The oak leaf and pine cone appliques are scroll sawn from copper foil, then burnished in a torch flame which brings out some great colors.

Finally, the intarsia Santa is a daily reminder of the gifts we have received and to keep the spirit of cheer year-round.

I am looking for an arts and crafts hall coat stand to round out the collection. Any ideas?

This was one of my first woodworking projects as an adult returning to the craft after many years. It also took two years to complete, as the first time around I failed to get the case frame straight and the drawers were terrible. Finally I scrapped the first set of drawers and remade them, adding walnut accents and custom made drawer pulls. A priime example of learning more from my mistakes than my successes.

Anyone have any hints how to improve the thumbnails – anything with vertical orientation seems to get clipped off.

Thanks.

Another project that incorporates elements of art with craftsmanship. The plaque itself is paduak, and has some small worm-holes for authenticity. Thie chicadee is made up from different colored woods (red oak, walnut, cherry, maple, mahogany).

I really liked this project because it combined woodworking with ceramics (sort-of). It was my introduction to angled joinery as the legs are wider at the bottom for a more stable stance.

The variety of tiles available allow for endless customization posibilities. I would like to do one with the photo tiles I have seen available from several vendors and at arts and craft shows.

The last photo shows it in use – the real purpose is to keep the plants high enough so my dog cannot destroy them!

Two different size oak footstools I made a few years ago. These were among my first projects, and combine beauty (IMHO) with utility. Sharp eyed Lumber Jocks will note that I inadvertantly installed the cross support on the smaller footstool upside down!

The larger one is 16” high and the smaller is 13”. The smaller one is the perfect size to supervise the grandchildren in the bathtub so it has been well-used. Both feature a hand hole in the top for ease of portability, and through-tenons for strength and stability.