Stuck in New Hampshire and Stocking Stuffers

These are some of my pens that I made for stocking stuffers this year. Below are two made of curly maple and one of mahogany.  It is fun to have something that I have made and that is so useful that I can carry in my pocket.  I love them and my family seemed to really like them.  Let me know if you are interested. 

  

We came to New Hampshire for Christmas and may be here for another day. The snow storm is still going strong at about 11am on Monday.  I have things that I want to get done in the shop but I don't think it is worth having a hectic 8 hour drive home that would normally be 3 hours. 

Below is a project that I need to get back to.  It will be 4 custom High Work Stools with walnut seats and a 28" height.  The ash legs are all shaped and ready, the seats are rough cut and drilled.  The seats still need to be sculpted and the stretchers will need to made. See my High Work Stool here.

Happy Snow Day.

'Twas the Night Before Christmas... Stealth Windsors

Just a few shots to show the progress on my 10 Waltham chairs.  

A few hanging in the raw awaiting their first coat of milk paint.  10 chairs in the shop take up a lot of space, so hanging them up helps clear up the floor quite a bit.

All lined up after the first coat of paint, The arm chairs in the foreground have been buffed. You can see that they are a bit more grey looking.  Before the buffing, they are very flat black and rough.  They remind me of stealth bombers at this point. They almost absorb light.  Maybe I can get a lucrative contract making Stealth Windsors for the Pentagon.

 Have a Merry Christmas,

Tim

Time to make the spindles...

Below are shots of the shaving horse and some of the 90 spindles that I am making for a set of 10 Waltham chairs.  I rough them out on the table saw and jointer but the final rounding and sizing is done on the shaving horse with a hand plane.  In order to make them match, they are laid out side by side.  If one is larger than the others it will be evident.  The eye is very good at detecting something that is not like the others.  The image at the bottom is a clump of ash shavings  (don't say this at home).  Ash is chosen for spindles because of its strength along the grain.  Even the shavings can be molded into a ball.  If you were to try this with cherry, you would end up with a pile of dust.

Our first real snow came yesterday. We got enough to plow. Today, I managed to get the chains on the tractor.  Each one weighs around 70 lbs so it is not an easy task. It seems that there is always a project get in the way of paying work. Especially this time of year.

Happy snow.

     

Making Some Progress on 10 Waltham Windsor Chairs

I have just finished assembling the seat and legs for 2 Waltham arm chairs and 8 Waltham side chairs.  These will be painted with black milk paint.  The seats on my painted chairs are made of Poplar which is not very pretty but it is strong and it paints well.  The legs are made of ash.  The chair on the table saw still has all of its wedged tenon joints untrimmed.   That chair is having its feet marked for leveling on the table saw. Then I have it in the vise in order to saw to the marked lines and to clean up the other joints on the legs.  The backs will go on soon. First I have to finish shaving the 90 plus spindles.
See my chair page on my website to see all of my chair designs.