What Am I Doing in my Spare Time....Woodworking!

It's been a little over a month since I found the Woodworkers Guild, thanks to my dear friend and blog reader, Gwen.  In that time I have jumped in head first, as usual.  There are two groups, the woodturners and the scroll sawers.  Most people in the group are one or the other.  I've decided to do both.  Typical, right.  This weekend is the Gwinnett Woodworkers Show.  We have a booth at the show and Hans asked me to work a few hours making puzzles.  Mind you I have never scroll sawed before unless you count the 5 mins I did it in a meeting a couple weeks ago.  But, what the hell.  I'll do it.

Here I am at the show, scroll sawing puzzles.

I got a little nervous about it after finding out the people were actually paying for these puzzles.  I actually did a really good job and I can't wait to make some for the store.

This is George, he is one of the master scrollers in the group. This was a better shot to see what we were actually doing.  We would take a digital picture of the person.  Print it out on digital photo paper.  Glue it to a piece of wood.  Then we scrollers would turn it into a puzzle.  We didn't have lines to follow, we just got to be creative with it.  You know I love that!  I forgot to take pictures of one of my puzzles.

There are many different projects that can be made with the scroll saw.  I took a picture of the scroll sawed portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  You can see part of the GA bull dog to the right.  I plan to do small versions of these for the 1/6 scale dolls.

This is me taking private lessons with Jack, one of our master turners in the group.  On the 6th day of the first week of going to the meeting, I met Jack at a woodturner's evening meeting.  He told me he taught one-on-one classes.  The next day I was there in his home shop, ready to learn how to use a lathe machine.  Here I am in a small portion of his shop.

This is Miguel the other student that takes classes, too.  He is working on a much bigger lathe.  But everything I was doing on the small lathe, I can do on the big one, too.  I can even do Barbie sized pieces on this big lathe.

This is a picture of Jack's house.  Take note of where the RV is located.

This is Jack demoing at the woodworker's show this weekend.  His hat was made on one of these machines.  It is made of wood.

This is a picture of Jack's workshop, which is right behind his house and over the little fish pond he built.  I am standing right behind the RV and taking this picture.

A closer look at the two story shop he built himself in 5 yrs time.  There is a two story glass front that overlooks the pond.  On the top level is his art studio, and a small apartment.  The first level has a large metal workshop that takes up 3/4 of the first floor.  The other 1/4 is the wood working shop that you saw me in with the lathe machine.

Our regular meetings are every Saturday morning from 7:30am - 10am.  Three Saturdays ago we had a field trip to Pierce and Pierce, an Architectural Design Business.  We got to see there manufacturing facility.

There I am.  Those are not both my pairs of legs. LOL!  When I first saw this picture, I was thrown by the extra jeans until I realized it was the legs of the guy next to me.

I love big machines.

The wood piece shown was turned on a lathe just like I was working with.  Of course it was MUCH bigger.

Meet Susie.  She is a retired neuro surgeon and an incredible wood worker.   She did a Saturday class on Finishing.  I am always excited to see the women woodworkers.

She was most impressive.  She, too has an incredible workshop that she put together herself.  If I ever needed a brain surgeon, she would be top on my list.

So that's what I've been doing in my spare time.  Earlier I posted the Easter basket winner.  Make sure you look if you were on the list.  Later I will be posting a new sofa with a tweaked design.  Don't forget to come back!