02.29.2012 Installed a real air cleaner yesterday!

All by myself. And here's a challenge... How the heck did I do it without anyone else's help?! The ceiling is about 9' off the floor. Almost ALL of the tools and items I used include:

• Hammer
• One small nail
• Stud Finder
• Chains like you see holding up the filter
• Ladder
• Pencil
• Two pair of pliers: one "gas pliers," one "channel-lock" type
• Electric Drill
• Drill Bit (for ceiling anchors' holes)
• Four hooks.
• Ornamental chain links
• What else did I use to get it up there?!

Hint: no ropes, chains or pulleys were used, although I did use a modified trick the ancient Egyptians used to set the Obelisks...

12.05.2011 First two orders ship out today! I'm thrilled!

I shopped Michael's Arts & Craft Store for things to decorate stoppers. I found some nice items that you'll see on the New Items Page soon.
I even might be able to offer a selection which could be added to a finished stopper. That should be interesting... and a challenge. We'll see.

I finished CH 39 and added photos to the Catalog Page. Then I realized I hadn't sanded it first, so I backtracked up that process tree and then polished it again. Much nicer.

Recently I discovered something about wood, too... or had it slapped upside my head: wood shrinks more sideways, or cross-grain, than it does "lengthwise," or with-the-grain. This showed up when the inlays on several candle holders like CH 23 and CH 24 aged a bit and the cross-wise inlays began to "poke out past the edges" !

I sanded the appropriate sides down flush and re-polished them. Much nicer, now. And a lesson learned about inlay work: keep the grain parallel or let the item "age" a while before final finishing.

12.02.2011 Orders are starting to arrive! Back to the workshop, quick, or my inventory will be gone!

11.30.2011 A few days ago, my next-door neighbor took down a large tulip tree (I think) in his front yard. While I slept in.

He moved all of the cuttings to his back yard wood dump, from which I'd rescued quite a few logs for my shop in the past. I discovered where he'd put them and fired up my trusty Husqy chain saw and got my aerobic exercise for November and at least half of December.

It went well on the stacks under my deck, including a lot of maple, oak and pine from when he cleared out a lot of his back yard's forest to make room for a large play set for his kids. Our agreement: if I want it and I can move it, I can have it.

I collected quite a few nice pieces that may become bowls, including several nice, large crotch-wood samples. I think what I'll do is rough-turn several of them and store them for spring. The rest will age under the deck where they're not exposed to direct sunlight but do get wet from rain, creating what I hope will be a slow-curing process for them. I also still have a lot of large pine and maple pieces from his last-summer clear cutting stacked on a garden cart in my garage. They seem to be drying very nicely with little cracking in that environment. Maybe I should bring more up from under the deck...