Just finished new carving

Thought I would upload a picture of my latest carving. I turned an 18" baseball bat out of basswood. This little fellow is named "BlackJack". I have a couple more named "Billy" and "Mace". Enjoy!

Tool Identification while carving

I bought a couple of 12" and 18" magnetic strips used to hold a set of knives in a kitchen. I think they were $8 or $10 each from Woodworkers Supply. I mounted the long one to the edge of my carving table and one on the inside of the lid of my carving box. When I'm carving next to the table I keep the tips up where I can see them. They snap on and off the strip instantly, are held in place very firmly, and now they don't roll off the table or get jumbled in a pile anymore as I speed carve (LOL). When you get 20 or 30 tools all over the table it gets crazy-frustrating. The strip in the lid is for traveling, shows etc... I use mostly the interchangeable Flexcut tools in my kit. As I carve I can toss them on the strip and even close the lid quickly if needed and not drop them all over the place. As far as marking them, I engraved all the Flexcut tools with the catalog number to identify them. I am a Flexcut dealer and have most all the profiles in the shop. This way a customer can try the tool before they buy and I can instantly identify the number so that they get the right tool off the rack. "Letterset" makes sheets of dry transfer letters and numbers that could be put on the handles. They transfer from the sheet by rubbing with a small stick. You can then cover with a little clear spray etc... They could then be removed later if the tools were going to be sold. I used this technique several years ago before I started using the engraver.

Sealing wood ends to prevent cracking.

As you all know, shortly after cutting any type of wood, it will begin to crack. If you store your wood in a place where it is at all dry this can happen overnight. Apple and Cherry will crack in just a few hours indoors, sometimes the ends will split several inches and ruin the whole piece. There are several ways to slow this down and sometimes prevent it from happening. In the past I've melted wax in an deep electric skillet. Then I would dip both ends of the piece. This absolutely works great, but you have to have a goodly supply of wax, candles etc... around and it really only works for the ends or small (whole) pieces. About two years ago I switched to a product called Anchor Seal. It is a liquid wax that air dries in an hour or so, sometimes shorter depending on the storage facility. The advantage over melting wax is that you can brush it into hard to get at places. This is especially good for coating all the small branch ends cut off of a walking stick. I will cut 20 or 30 walking sticks in a weekend and immediately coat both ends and any branch cut offs and put them on a drying rack. Sometimes the ends will drip if I put too much on so I put a couple of sheets of newspaper on the floor under each end. When I get ready to carve, the wax can either be scraped off or the ends can be put into warm water for a minute or so and most if the wax will wipe off. Also if I am carving wood that is still green, I will coat the carved area with the liquid wax if I cannot finish the piece in one sitting. I've had noses and beards split too badly to be repaired letting wood dry too quickly.

Well here is my second book, "Carving a HatMan". I used a weeping willow branch for this one, but any tree with branches (LOL) could be used to create the hat peak. The inspiration for this carving was from a ceramic Santa Clause that my wife puts out every year on the fireplace mantle. His beard just sort of hung over the edge of the shelf. I found that Weeping Willow carves just as easy as Basswood and in my area is more plentiful than any other species. In this book I take the student from harvesting the HatMan blanks through a finished shelf hanger with big bushy mustash. The gallery is loaded with pleanty of examples and should be a great resource for anyone that loves to carve.

You can have a signed copy with free shipping to the lower 48 states for only $14.95. You can become a dealer by ordering only 6 copies, mix or match with any of my other books. Send me an email if interested.

Okay here is look at my first book. It's been a couple of years since I've written "Carving a Closet Buddy", but it's getting a little more popular all the time. I first got the idea of writing this book when my wife purchased some aromatic red cedar blocks to put in her wool sweater box. I thought why not write a book on how to carve this type of wood. I also wanted to keep all the steps simple but detailed enough so that a beginner could easily finish the project. I tried to give each character a slightly angry look so that if the cedar smell didn't chase away the moths, the facial expression would. LOL Being sort of a self starter, I took all the photos myself with a time delayed digital camera. I did all the publishing using MS Word, and contracted a local print shop do all the printing. I felt this would be the best way to control the stock inventory and would keep the book from prematurely going out of print. (Plus I saved a bundle on a third party publisher costs and control all the rights). Check out further posts for my other books.

Anyone can have a signed copy with free shipping to the lower 48 states for only $12.95. You can become a dealer by ordering only 6 copies, mix or match with any of my other books. Send me an email if interested.

Springtime

Now that spring is here (sort of), it's now time to get out in the woods and harvest some walking sticks. If you want to easily peel the bark off of maple and the like, this is the best time to do it. The sap is flowing and the bark will peel without any damage to the stick underneath. On the other hand if you want to keep the bark on don't cut them yet. If you do, as they dry the bark will not stay attached and you will end up with a bark tube. LOL