“Turning” into a new year, 2.23
Sometime in Q4 of last year I purchased a used Delta midi-sized lathe - but Surprise(!) - the lathe is only a fraction of the things you need. So I spent some time gathering the other equipment and gear needed to begin turning and learning. But before I started the process of acquiring the lathe and gear I was able to spend part of a day learning from a fellow woodcarver who has been turning for many years. Doug walked me through the basics and I turned a small pine bowl and a pen at his garage workshop. So last December and at home with the essential equipment gathered (HSS gouges, chuck/jaw, sharpening system(s), mask and faceshield, etc.) I went about my way learning to turn bowls. So here’s my first few bowls in chronological order.
Beef Wellington - its what’s for dinner
Flashback to Christmas when we made beef wellingtons for the first time. We splurged on the meat from a local butchers shop and followed Gordon Ramsay recipe pretty close. It was quite tasty and something we will do again.
Garage Workshop
In addition to the woodturning experiments I finished a few other projects and here are a couple:
Display box for gallery space. Box-joint walnut with hand carved basswood inset. Shellac finish
Small storage box for my diamond sharpening stones from reclaimed furniture. Poplar with box-joint construction.
Calico Campout
A few buddies ventured out with me for a camping trip out near the “Ghost Town” of Calico. Friday we had relatively good weather and several trucks, some of who stayed through Saturday’s relentless rain/drizzle. Great company despite the weather and we had a great campfire Friday till late.
And there was carving…
On New Years day I spent most of the day following along from a woodcarving instruction book titled “The Eyes Have It” from the Character Carvers of America where top carvers shared their process for carving expressive eyes. It was a really good challenge/study and one I’ll attempt again on a slightly larger size.
Burrowing Bartholomew, my 154th carving.
This is “RavenBot Command Caravan MkI” a carving that evolved from beginning to end and surprised me along the way. More pics of this oddity here, it’s definitely something different.
Blogging About Blog:
I’ve spent some time updating content here, including building out a full library of my RavenBot Workshop carvings as well as other general tidying up of older projects and navigation. Hope that it makes it easier to follow along, but really it was time for some housekeeping for my own attention/sanity.
Other memories:
Beth and I took in a day at Disneyland while the Christmas decorations were up.
Gabby explores just how close she can get to the heater