Long Spoon, and Another Cedar Project

 You don't know you need a long spoon until you get one and then wonder how you lived without it. Big pots of chilli, stew and simmering fruit all need a long spoon to reach deep into the pot's corners while keeping your hands happy and safe. 

  This one is walnut, finished with Hemp Oil. I shaped the spoon mostly with knives after roughing it out on the band saw.  Hollowing out the bowl of the spoon is a job for my Dremel Tool. I like using walnut for spoons because it is fairly hard and yet it is easy to get a glass smooth finish.

  We have several hand made spoons in the kitchen drawers now and it is surprising how often it is better to have a slightly longer, or stouter spoon at hand.

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  I have been working away with my found cedar. Yesterday another project emerged that suits found cedar.  This time I cut the strips on the table saw, I am leaning toward hand tools, but haven't fallen in totally. 

BOOT CLIPS revisited. 2014 March first visit.

  Winter has arrived and so it is tall boot season. 

  The boot clip is like a extra large clothes peg.  It keeps soft boots from flopping over, taking too much space by the door or in the closet.

   The design is two long pieces with a spacer in between. Once I got the boards cut into strips I used my hand planes to clean up and smooth the wood and a shop knife and files to round various edges. 

jack and smoothing plane.

  I think cedar is the perfect wood for these holders and it planes nicely. I'm making 6,  almost no noise and lovely shavings.  I have a Anant Jack plane with an up graded blade and a Veritas low angle smoother. (thanks Santa)  For a couple of years I was the Canadian Importer of Anant planes.  I always frond them to be good general carpentry tools.

  Time to think about some more quick Christmas gifts from the shop.

cheers ianw

  

Bird House - Tea Pot

 Having written 1128 posts over nearly a decade I have never really broken into the "Big Time". I am not surprised, I chose not to get involved in Video Blogging six or seven years ago when that was the coming thing, and I know that I am not so skilled a craftsman that the internet hangs on my every word.

  Today's blog is a clear example of why I am still here, but not a big noise on the net.

   A coupe of weeks ago I picked up an armful of discarded cedar deck boards. Cedar is nice to work with, especially with hand tools. I used some of the boards to knock out a planter for our back deck and now I am making a bird house.

  This bird house has been put together with glue and finishing nails and soaked with 1/1/1 finish.($). I enjoyed making this bird house which I will have my grand daughter paint when she is here for Christmas holidays. Why was the such an enjoyable project? I only used hand tools.  Cedar is wonderful to cut and plane. While making this project my shop smelled of cedar and the floor was covered with sweet smelling shavings. My shop looked like something from a children's story where a white haired Grampa is making something for someone special. Well....I am a white haired Grampa (Opa) and I was making it for my oldest grand daughter. 

  I have a shop filled with tools, some good, others excellent, both modern and traditional. With my full 'power tools' shop I could have knocked dozens of bird houses out in time it took to make this one.  All the saw dust would be collected in my shop vac system from my table saw and random orbital sanders and the product would be excellent. It would be efficient and praise worthy,  every yard has room for another bird house.

  Instead the process became the goal, not the product.  As long as a bird house emerged from the time in the shop, how fast it happened did not matter.

  So, I began rough cutting out the wood to length with a hand saw from my Grandfather's work shop, I'm 63 and I'm sure the saw is 25 years older than I am.  That saw built houses and boats, boxes and furniture when my Father was a little boy.  Once I got the boards roughed to length I used my Jack Plane to flatten then.  I created mounds of feather-like shavings and filled my shop with the aroma of  dry cedar. After I got the wood splinter free I cut everything to size. I have a rip saw from my Father's shop that is a joy to use and in dry soft wood, quite effortless.

I drilled some holes, drove some nails and used a nail set to sink the heads.  And voila a bird house is born.

  When you make a bird house don't just drill a random hole, find out what birds are in your area and drill an appropriate opening.  

 ***Also don't put a peg below the hole.  The birds that live there fly in and so don't need a peg, that don't climb into their homes. All the peg does is provide a place for a predator bird to perch while attacking eggs or baby birds.***

 The other thing I did was put a good, useful handle onto my lovely new tea pot.

  I have a copper wire core surrounded by small branches from our Mulberry bush wrapped in hemp cord. I'm not 100% convinced that this the the best look, I think the handle is too heavy for a delicate little pot but...it will do from now.

  The more I work in my shop lately the more and am moving away from noise and dust. It don't know if this is a fad or evolution.

cheers ianw

($) 1-1-1 finish is one part varnish,one part linseed oil and one part turpentine. It dries slowly but soaks in really well.

Photo frame, tea pot and book rack

I have puttered away in the shop lately, and actually finished a couple of things.

Painting from P.E.I

  This photo frame is made from found wood and found glass. Eva bought the painting while on a week's holiday in September. We are a bicycle riding family, so we like bike art.

There is plenty of talent in our family.  My niece and her mother throw pots and I have one of their tea pots.  It is lovely and will live in my shop.  I am working on a handle, the glue is drying as I type. 

  The tea pot is sitting on one of my favourite book rack patterns. I think I have made at least a dozen.

  This version used 24 inches of re-claimed cedar decking. I cut the board into its three pieces then hand planed and sanded it smooth.  The angle is just enough to lean the books over. 

   I know that cedar dust it dangerous but with the right precautions cedar is lovely to work, it is light, strong and smells great. I used one coat of Garnet toned shellac just to seal the grain and bring out the high lights a bit.  

  A project like this is a great, easy D.I.Y type gift. This is another project for a two power tool shop.  The two power tools, a jig saw and a cordless drill. If you are starting out or have limited space or money those two power tools and a hand full of basic hand tools will build lots and lots of small things that will personalise your home and life.

  Winter is coming folks, we put up our Christmas lights today.

 cheers ianw

 

Spreaders, Spatulas and Spoons, Oh My.

Those of us playing in our workshops must remember and respect.

 November happily has had unusual weather. This day last year I needed my snow blower, this week I've been out riding my motorcycle.  We know for sure that there will be weather, we just don't know what kind. 

  In the shop lately  I have been making spoons and spreaders for church sales.

  These wooden tools have been made from milled lumber that was collecting in a box by the bench.  I like to make longer spreaders to reach to the bottom of the peanut butter jar.

  There were a whole spectrum of tools used to make these pieces, power does make it happen faster.

Bench and Sanding Station

  First I cut the basic shape with the band saw then various sanders and my Dremel Rotary Tool makes short work of these pieces. Generally I used planes, saws and sanders on milled lumber as I find it more difficult to shape with knives and chisels.  If I begin with a piece of wood that is split out it seems that the grains works with me rather than against me and so I use knives much more in the shaping process.

  Years ago I recovered an A.V. cart from a school dumpster. It had lost a wheel. It wasn't that difficult to replace a missing caster and I've used it as a sanding station since. When I am in production like this I roll the sanding station into place, clamp the Dremel to the bench and layout all the tools I could want to use. 

  The final stage for the spoons is hand sanding with 400 grit and a hemp oil finish.

  The other thing I did one evening was:

  When I  made my antler handled tankard I had two small bits of horn left.  I love the feel of horn. I got an inspiration to use the small bits of antler.  These are two horn handled scrapers/awls . The blade is 1 inch finishing nail, one pointed and the other hammered into a thin wedge shape. I frequently use a nail or knife to scrap crud out the teeth on a file or rasp or dislodge dried lumps from sanding belts.  I now have a couple of proper tools for those scraping jobs and won't need to risk my knife's edge.  There are other ongoing uses for a fine tipped awls and these fill that need.

  Remember, Christmas is just around the corner, get making your gift. 

cheers ianw

For The Fallen:  

Poem by Lauren Binyon

Music by my friend David S. Fawcett,