Category Archives: Wood

I built a corner shelf to go at the end of this run of cabinets. It has always felt a little unfinished, and I think this shelf really rounds it out. I even managed to get the color to match! Now I just need to find something to put there.

Here are a set of bowls I've finished over the last couple of weeks, that I've just now gotten around to taking pictures of. In order, they are: apple and white ash (first image), white ash (second image), a great big white ash bowl, over nine inches in diameter (third image), apple (fourth image), curly pyinma (fifth image).

I just finished this sofa table to go behind the love seat in our living room. I built it from some red oak lumber I milled from a tree in our yard with my chainsaw last year. I left the slab top 'live-edge' (i.e., bark still on), and did the same for the apron. It's pretty dusty in this picture (it had just come out of the shop), but I think it looks pretty good all the same.

Here a couple of bowls I've made recently. The one on the left is from a chunk of spalted hickory, and it now sits atop our entertainment center in the living room. The one on the right is from a tree that fell across the path I cut in our back yard - which was actually the tree that got me interested in buying a lathe in the first place. I made it for Andi for her birthday.

On the far left is a plate I made on the lathe out of a piece of spalted hickory I cut up two summers ago. And all the way to the right is a small bowl from some of the wood from the apple tree I helped a friend cut down in early November. In the middle is a small vessel made from hickory burl that I'm pretty sure I've posted here before.

To help Lori reach Carter in her new bed in order to tuck her in, I took a couple of hours one weekend and built this little step stool for Carter's room. I built it out of some of the red oak lumber I milled with my chainsaw last year from a tree that fell in our woods. So this stool went from tree to useable object all without leaving our yard! I really love the ray fleck in that oak. That's one benefit of sawing it yourself - you get to choose how you cut it. In this case, I chose to cut a few pieces quartersawn to expose the rays.

A few weeks ago, I helped a friend cut down an apple tree that was growing too close to his house. I took a whole bunch of the wood home with me, to use for woodturning. Since then, I've roughed out all of these bowls. Once they've finished drying out, I can turn them down to finished thickness, and put some finish on them. But for now, they're still soaking wet. While turning them on the lathe, I sometimes ended up with a line down my shirt and across the floor of water. When turning fresh apple wood, there's a smell almost of apple cider - it was pretty cool. I really like the contrast between the dark red heartwood and the cream-colored sapwood in these pieces. Apple has a tendency to crack and twist pretty badly as it dries, so if at least 50% of these rough-turned blanks make it through to finished bowls, I'll be really happy.

Here are photos of a couple of things I've made recently and forgot to post. From left to right: a weed pot made from some hickory burl that I cut last year, a new piece of origami, and a small vessel made from another chunk of that hickory burl. All three are on display on a shelf in our living room. I really like that I'm starting to display some of the things I've made around the house. I normally give away so much of what I make that I don't keep anything for myself. For example - in high school, I was really into sculpting stone. But even though I made several pieces while I was there, I don't own even one of them - they've all been given away to family and friends. Which still makes me happy, just in a different way.

And here are a whole bunch of weed pots that I made as Christmas presents. These are a blast to make. I can usually make one start to finish in one session, and they have no 'set' pattern, so they really give me a chance to get creative. I think I need to make a bunch more of these to scatter around our house. As an added bonus, all of these weed pots were made from wood that I gathered on our property.

Here are a set of screwdrivers that I turned on the lathe for Christmas presents as well. They came out great! I still have one more kit so that I can make one for myself.