Year 18, Week 46, Day One (week 984)

Year 18, Week 46, Day One (week 984)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-22-18 Thursday

68 degrees early morning, 81 late afternoon. Mostly cloudy all day with a little bit of broken clouds. They repaired the clouds a bit later. Some storm cells appeared over the Everglades, started east, dissipated, and reappeared over the ocean. Low humidity and a light breeze kept things comfortable all day long, making it a true pleasure of a day. Even people who live in air conditioning loved it. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

We were having a BBQ for Thanksgiving this year. I intended to just do a little bit of work and leave it to others. Yeah, Right!!! I was up and down, from one side of the house to the other, fetching stuff as I knew where they were.  We had eleven people and everybody enjoyed themselves, having their fill of just about anything. We all ended up with loads of leftovers. 

I did do some crochet. I took out a small ball of yellow yarn and started on a zig zag dish cloth.  With the zig zag dish cloth I made for mom, I made a mistake and then messed it up really good trying to fix the mistake. On this one, I put a good dent in the ball of yarn when I realized I made the same kind of mistake. I had skipped a stitch where you jump several previous stitches and pull them together to create a Vee in the fabric.  
I started correcting it and it was looking ugly, so I removed a bunch of rows until I got to where I made the mistake and started the rest of it right. I did not get to the point I was before as I ran out of time. I had to wind the rest of the yarn around the ball. The ball was one I had rolled to allow it to draw from the center. I will have to do a lot of stitches to get back to the center pull. I intend to finish this roll up, which was small, and then change colors to complete it.

Of course, I was involved in putting things away. I had help, but still I was running back and forth.

When I went to bed, I was hobbling. I had fun over-doing it. 

I hope to do some wood working tomorrow. I will see.

Year 18, Week 46, Day Two (week 984)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-23-18 Friday

72 degrees early morning, 83 late afternoon.  Lots of blue sky, puffs thin enough to where I don’t remember the sun being blocked. A nice breeze kept it comfortable. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

We headed out to a rummage sale (church yard sale). Everything was priced right. It was so tough to avoid getting things I already have too many of. They had a coffee grinder (I have four), a meat slicer (I have three), a air popper (I have three air poppers (one looks like a cart) and a popper with the wire that moves the popcorn around in the oil).  If I knew for a fact these things were not going to sell, I would have rescued them with the idea of passing them on, but since I cannot see the future, I left them.
This church made two mistakes. One was they did not put their address in their notice in the paper and we first went to the wrong church, and they chose Black Friday to have it. Everybody is out in stores buying new stuff on sale.  If they had it Saturday, they might have done better but still the wrong weekend..
People were walking out with a lot of stuff. They gave us free cloth bags to hold our  finds while shopping. I was somewhat good. I did have a bag full of stuff, but I feel I chose right. Later in the afternoon we drove by and they had a couple trucks they were loading. I think the stuff was going to be donated to something like the Salvation Army. 

I worked on my ornaments today. One spout on the tea pot popped off and went to the ground. I could not find it among the shavings already there. I cut a piece off a tea pot blank I had not started on, and glued the piece on as the spout. After the glue set some I carved some excess wood off. It will look good when done, but I need the glue to set more before I get aggressive. Most of the tea pots are close to being done. 
I hunted all over for a sanding disk I have for the lathe. I had rounded and flattened a two by board, mounted on a small face plate, and sized it for the 9" stick-on sanding disks. I also glued a strip of emery cloth around the outside. I could not find that disk. I have no idea where it went. It should be easy to find, but it was not there.
I decided to take the plate off the dead disk sander to mount it in the lathe. The screw, acting like a pin, holding it to the shaft, would not come out, damaging the screw driver and the screw slot. I even tapped (banged) on it. Then on a lark I plugged the sander in and the motor started.
I sanded each roof and base of the gingerbread houses to eliminate the bowing and roughness of the jig saws cuts I had made, and corrected some of the really bad walls (like when a knot was in the way). One I messed up house a little by holding it at the wrong angle and lost the eve on one side. I just cut back on the wall to create a new eve.  The peaks of several of the roofs are not centered, but that, I think, will add to the charm (hope, hope, hope).
The disk needs a new sandpaper but I have no idea where the replacements are so this will do for now. 

Later in the day, mom needed to pick something up that she ordered so we headed out. After her stop, we went to Wal Mart. We have many Wal Marts in our area. I am not exactly sure how big this one was, but it was wearing colored tights and had a cape waving in the wind.  I am pretty sure it was the biggest in the county.
I walked across the store several times and then around the outside. My legs were not happy when we finally headed home. Mom had a trainee for a cashier and that girl had serious problems getting things to ring up properly. It took a very long time. Wal Mart really only has seats in their deli restaurant. I was at the other side of the entrance. We were lucky that we found a parking place right near the entrance at the store end of the parking lot. Somehow, I do not know how, I avoided buying anything.
I had to go out back when we got home and put everything away before I could go home. Talk about wore out. I did feel it when I laid down to sleep. 

I hope to get more ornaments finished before the weekend is over. 

I will see what I actually do tomorrow.


Year 18, Week 46, Day Three (week 984)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-24-18 Saturday

68 early morning 86 in the afternoon. Nice breeze kept things feeling cool, along with low humidity.  Blue skies, mostly sunny,  some high clouds and low clouds but few times where the sun was blocked by them until late afternoon. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

After breakfast we looked to see if there were any yard sales in our immediate area, but there were none. We came home and I got to work. I needed to work on the ornaments, but decided I really had to find some stuff buried in the shed. 
I dug deeper than I intended, but did not check things out below knee level, which included a couple bins. I left some battery drill stuff alone. I was not in the mood to deal with them.  Most of the batteries are dead and some of the chargers are also dead. That will be a good long day on finding what works. 
I found the “chowder box” which has raw materials for metal turning and machining projects. I also found a lot of partial projects and materials for future projects. I found loads of tools and boxes for tools. I found my sand paper, and sanding accessories.  I have a couple cloth bags of partially made platters. I was practicing making platters for a demonstration for the club. A close passing hurricane stopped that and then all sorts of stuff happened later to prevent me from getting back into it for the past few years.
After moving stuff around, I ended up making loads of room in the shed. I got some power tools closer to the door so we can get to them. I have an idea where a lot of stuff is now.

Last week, I noticed that the center hasp for the metal tackle box, that I keep my dremmel in, was broke. I decided I would have to replace the box. I dug out all the tool boxes and cases with the intent of swapping boxes. I had consolidated a couple tool boxes and was ready to start moving dremmel stuff into a new box, when I noticed there were two latches to the lid of the dremmel tool box, one near each end. I slapped my forehead. How blind!!! the center hasp which is used for locking the box, was likely broken before I first got this box years ago. I always used the side latches to keep the lid locked so I could carry it. Somehow, I forgot they were there!!!! Sheesh. Talk about getting old!!!

I did find another box that can be used for dremmel stuff and moved some dremmel motors into it and a few items that go with them. More will be done later.
When I am completely done, I will have two boxes of dremmel stuff, one for at home and one at Mom’s. 

All the walking back and forth wore my legs out. I never did work on the ornaments but found a lot of stuff I have used for decorating ornaments.  I have glitter, fabric I used for snow man scarves, thread, just to name some of the things I have used over the years. I will have to go through that stuff with more care later.

I have an idea for my Christmas Cards. I will have to do a couple quick “sketches” to see if it works. It might also be good for another ornament. Not for this year, but for next. Will see how that goes. This year, I will only have the gingerbread house and the tea pots. The rocking horse and this other idea will be made for next year, at best.

I was done for the day, leaving a mess under Mom’s awning, but everything safe from the weather for a day. Tomorrow, I will have to finish getting everything put away, and then finish the last of the tea pots and detailing the gingerbread houses. I will paint them during the week. Both will need a couple colors so I will add a color to all of them and let that dry, then do another color until they are all done. 

I will see what I actually accomplish tomorrow.



Year 18, Week 46, Day One (week 984)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-25-18 Sunday

66 degrees early morning 84 late afternoon, super high pebbled cloud cover with chem trails from the Fort Lauderdale Air Show crisscrossing the sky. I finally figured out why it feels so good these days at these temperatures. The humidity is low enough that it feels good. During the summer, when the humidity is 80 to 90 percent, it is oppressive. You get wet without doing anything. At below 70 percent, it begins to feel nice.  This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

When I got out to work, I had to put a bunch of stuff away, sort some others and put some in new containers. Zipper baggies rotted, cardboard boxes slumped from the effects of years of humidity. 
I found another dremmel, this one has a flexible shaft attachment that allows the motor to hang and one handle a smaller end of the bit. Somewhere, I have no idea where, I have a FORDUM which works with a flexible shaft. I found the bit set for it, but not the fordum. I know mom has an off brand one also. 
In machining, they usually have what is referred to as a CHOWDER BOX. This has bits of metal that can be used for many projects. I located mine and emptied it out and had a look at what I had. Wow. I have a couple pieces that are on the idea of half inch, by three inch by two inch. They are likely smaller, but they can be made into a number of things. One looks like I or my brother was machining it to size as there is a pass with a bit on one face, partly in from the side. I have a lot of interesting metal working projects to do. Some will be points for tail stocks or for drive spurs. I did not have the ability to make them the way I wanted at the time. I now have the tools and knowledge to make them.
I found some basswood and some partially done projects my dad had. I located a lot of great tools and had to put most of them away.  I also found some blanks for Christmas ornaments I made year before and did not complete the set. 
I will have to, at a later time, completely empty out the shed. I found traces of some bugs eating wood and tossed out several pieces. I will have to examine all them and get rid of some of it. Everything will have to be stacked properly so that stuff I will not need will be buried the deepest. 

I touched up the tea pots and sanded the bottoms to level them out. I then did all the windows and doors on the ginger bread houses. I have some “feathers” where bits did not cut separate properly, to remove, and then I can paint them. These will work nicely.

Mom gave me an idea for an ornament. I won’t be able to make them for Christmas this year, but can make them and the rocking horses for next year. I will eventually make the horses.  I do have an idea of how to improve the design. I want to carve them once I have blanks made. It will require a bit more cutting and gluing of wood to make it work.

I have this weekend to get everything done. I don’t have to have the complete dozen made, but I want to have some to show after the first. The rest can be made as opportunity allows.
I intend to pick up some card stock for my Christmas cards during the week. I also will start painting the ornaments. I am hoping they will look good. One thing I will do is leave the bottoms bare wood, other than a varnish coat, so there is no question of what they are made of. I will also sign the bare wood before the varnish coat. 

I will see what happens next weekend. 

2698

Mom put some of those light projectors up as her Christmas Display. Pictures seldom show colors other than green

The book in back is one I wrote and got published with the help of my friend Nancy, who also posts on this blog. It is available on Amazon along with other book sellers as either an E-read or a paper book.

My knife is in front.  My unpainted ornaments are on display for the picture. 

The gingerbread houses are across the back except for a short one in the middle. Then there are 8 tea pots (one is really a coffee pot) in the middle group and then there are four tea pot blanks along the left. 

Year 18, Week 45, Day One (week 983)

Year 18, Week 45, Day One (week 983)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-17-18 Saturday

65 degrees (feels almost arctic when you are used to the 80s) in the morning. 84 in the afternoon. Mostly light clouds all day, mostly blue sky. Our coats came off after breakfast which was about 8:00. This weather report was brought to you by The Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism. 

THURSDAY

We had out wood turning club meeting. As we were meeting in a place where you cannot make a mess, and it is typically hard to come up with a demonstration, They convinced the Broward County Sheriff chief to come and talk about safety. I will admit that I forgot most of what he said an only have a strong impression of what I do remember. I think he talked about an hour and said this is usually a two to four hour presentation. He talked about different levels of wounds, shock, and how to deal with them. I cannot do justice to even a mention of what to do so I will skip that. I am positive there are presentations online to found that will explain what to do and how to handle them different situations. They will teach you far better than I could in a quick note. Taking classes would even be better.
Our next event is the club Christmas party which will be Saturday December 1. 

SATURDAY
 
Aunties Attic was today. It is like a collector’s yard-sale indoors. They were mean to me. Teddy bears everywhere, every one begging me to take them home The bears I have refuse to let any other share my love, so I cannot take any more home. so sad.
A couple friends had tables there. I tried to sell some things to mom for my friend but they were not exactly what she was after.  There were things that would be nice to have but I don’t have a place for them.
There were actually a few things that I had to figure out what it was. That is always fun. It adds some interest in hunting for things. 
They had some Wild Coffee plants for sale among some other house and yard plants people grow and offer. I did not mind getting one, but a woman bought two big plants as we were about to leave, so that took the pressure off me for buying them. There was another small one hidden away but because it was hidden, that was my excuse for not getting it. I really don’t need to kill one of those plants at this time. Maybe I will kill one, I mean try to grow one later.
Wild coffee is a relative to the coffee you drink, but the seeds, which are in berries are tiny. The berries are bland but almost sweet. One guy said made coffee with it a couple decades ago and the coffee was horrible tasting.  Thinking back now, I wonder how much he roasted them or if he did.... I was clueless about coffee (and other things) at the time and did not know what to discuss about coffee, and just remember him saying it tasted bad.

We found another yard sale run by a church group. There were some things that were interesting. I have a life-time supply of knives and kitchen utensils. I did buy another keyboard. It is cheaper and easier and to get a yard-sale replacement for the one at work than ask the office to get me a new one.  The office one is simply dirty. One almost needs to remove the keys and scrub each one. It is easier to pick up a yard sale find as a replacement. 

I had bought some meat for Thanksgiving and needed to take care of some of it. I had a 10 pound roll of hamburger I needed to slice. After rearranging the freezer to make more room,  I stuck it in the freezer and let the outside surface freeze, rotating it periodically. The partially frozen outside of the meat will keep them as patties when I slice them. Otherwise they squish.  After cutting the roll in half, I then ran the roll through my meat slicer. I made these thicker than I usually do, about half an inch thick, placing four of them in each gallon baggy and ended up with about 40 patties. I laid them flat to freeze overnight. 
I did not have room for slicing up a pork loin I had also packed up. Maybe tomorrow. I can res-tack the freezer agin and remove a couple things so I should be able to make room. 

I needed something in the back of the shed that mom lets me use for my stuff. The problem is that there is a lot of stuff stored there for the hurricane last year and that stuff would have to come out and go someplace. What I was after, was in no way visible so I decided, “forget it.” There is about seven things I really need but it is going to take some effort to get to them.

I nibbled a little bit on a couple of the tea pots I am making for ornaments, but not too much. 

About that time, It was time for an afternoon nap before leaving. You know you accomplished little between what you actually did when you know you did something else and have no as to clue what it was.

I expect to do more tomorrow.


Year 18, Week 45, Day two (week 983)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-18-18 Sunday

76 degrees early morning, 85 late afternoon. Sky was blue in the morning, a couple cotton swirls of clouds around noon. By three the cloud cover built up into a solid ripple. A light breeze made it really nice in the shade of the awning in back. This weather report is brought to you by The City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

I dug out my carving stuff, a portable table and my dremmels. I sat down and worked on my tea pot ornaments. I started shaping the tops with the dremmel, but decided it would be just as fast with the knife. I left a large knob on top. It should be smaller, but that will give room for the eye hook to dig in nicely and not break the wood. 
I broke one handle and two spouts off while I was working, and glued them back on. I have to get more glue. The tube was nearly empty so I stuck a skewer in and used that to place the glue where it needed to be. These were the ultra fine skewers. 

I finished about half the tea pots. I nibbled on one gingerbread house but I need to use a sander to clean up the surfaces before I go any father on them.  Since the disk sander motor is dead, I will stick a sanding disk on the lathe and use that for sanding. (Note to myself. Make a sanding table for the lathe when using the sanding disk.)

Weekend after this one is the deadline for getting at least these ornaments done. Even if I don’t do the rocking horses this year, I want the ones I have started, done. I start displaying them at the beginning of December. I have to finish the carving of everything, then paint them. That will be a tall task. The tea pots will be easy to paint, but the gingerbread houses is going to need some detail painting to make them look right. 

I just realized that December is almost here. I intended to come up with a Christmas card design already and start painting them so I could have them done well ahead of time. Three or four weeks sounds like a long time, but that disappears quickly. I have not even considered a design yet. It has to be interesting enough to be worth doing, but simple enough to do on some 50 or so cards each year. 
I hand paint my cards. Many people create a card and then print it. Hand painting is more interesting. It means more to me, and also to the person who gets it. There are people who have every single card I ever gave them.
The hard part is to come up with a design that I have not done. Christmas trees and snowmen are old hat. Even if they are in the tropics...  Last year, I tried to do a sleigh, and also a car filled with presents and they looked closer to a blob than anything. Some designs are just not doable. 

I buy card stock (which reminds me, I better get some more) and I add one color on a batch at one time. Usually a batch of cards is 20 cards. It is enough to use up the space I usually have to lay the cards out to dry. I work the background colors first, many times just one of the colors, but I have one more than one color if they blend in with each other. 
I should note that I am using bottles of acrylic paint. The colors are not pure so you really can’t mix them for the exact tones you are after. Think of the colors in the Sunday comics. It is hard to get shading and depth. 
After the background, I use the base color of the main subject, A medium green for trees, a white for a snow man, brown for the bear and get the basic shape. I have had painting instruction and experience so I know how to work the brush to get the effect I am after. Then I add additional colors to build up the image. Sometimes one color. When adding colored lights, I will have several brushes each with a different color and dab those colors on at one time. After the colors are all dry, I can then add lettering on the back of the cards, letting people know who made it and when. I then letter the inside with the message of the year. 
Back in the 80s, I took sign painting classes and as part of the learning, we worked with pens to do calligraphy. I understand the techniques and could tell people how to do it, but I cannot do it nowadays. My hands refuse to move the way I know they should. I really need to spend a couple months practicing to get good at it. Not depend on a couple weeks of actually doing it.  As it is, the messaging looks nothing like I want them to.

I re-stacked the freezer again. To make room, since there was space at the front of the shelf, I stacked about 12 patties in one zipper bag standing upright. That made room so that I could slice and freeze my pork steaks. I used the same setting as the hamburger on my slicer and made about 36 pork steaks that are about the size of the palm of my hand, not including the fingers. 
The meat slicer I am using is the last one I purchased. Several years ago, I had picked up a commercial style slicer and realized I did not want to have to clean it. I saw the meat slicer I am using the next week which is stainless steel plate and frame, with a removable motor, and talked myself out of it. I already had two slicer bodies and one motor. I came back the next week, thought it was gone, mentioned something about not having to buy it, and they had it buried. I came home with it. I had a friend pass on the commercial meat slicer for me. I have been satisfied with the meat slicer I am using now. It was exactly what I was after I can stick everything except the motor into a dishwasher or dishwater and clean them properly. It really made slicing the meat this weekend easy.

I need to do some stuff during the week in preparation for a 4 day weekend.
 
I will see. What I do next weekend.

2046

The drum sticks I showed off at the turning club meeting.

The left hand pair is in sea-grape.

The right hand pair is in black walnut.

Year 18, Week 44, Day One (week 982)

Year 18, Week 44, Day One (week 982)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-10-18 Saturday

74 early morning 87 late afternoon, a little tinkle on the grass during the night but dry during the day. Clouds appeared and disappeared from time to time.. A breeze made it nice. 

A friend showed up at the Restaurant when we were nearing the end of our breakfast so we invited him to join us and we sat and talked until he was done. It made breakfast really nice. We had seen in the paper (there are two pompano area papers that are about ten pages on average and they cover really local events) that there was a multi family yard sale. We decided to check it out. It was starting at nine and we figured they would be open by the time we got there. 
We hit several yard sales. I had my hands on a number of items but talked myself out of getting them. I did end up with a pipe clam kit. It has the jaws. You have to add your own pipe. 
I also found a NOOK. This is one of those “white paper” text readers. You download books onto them and read them on it. The older woman said she the text was too small and her husband said that he would change it but never did. She was happy with her phone. When we got back, I plugged it in to charge and when I could turn it on, I found the documentation on it and read about 35 pages before I found the format it uses. I added a couple books on it. It could not address the web site it was designed to get books from. I was able to use my computer to get books from Gutenberg.org and load them.
I later found it was easy to change the size of the text and to change the font it used. None of them did what better than what was already on there, I was really after so I set it to the default again.  This is supposed to have a really good battery and get days of reading out of a charge. I dug out my Sony reader tablet and found it uses the same formats and loaded a lot of books on it too. I now have the entire Oz series, some 10 books, on both of them. They were not the books I was really after, but they do for now. 
Mom happened to find exactly what she needed for some projects. She was really happy.  
Once in a while, you get demented yard sale people. One person stuck a really cute teddy bear in a chair at a condo yard sale. How sick can you get, to show a teddy bear in a natural habitat rather mixed in within a bag with all other kinds of stuffies. It is easy to ignore a bag but it is really hard to ignore a lone teddy bear sitting in a chair begging to go home with you. It took all my will power to avoid showing any interest in it. How can people be that cruel?
It is fun seeing what people have for sale. It is also interesting to hear why they are having a sale. Some are moving either to another part of town or out of state. One family had a flood in their house and had to get rid of a lot of stuff so it could be repaired. I did not ask the details of the flood. I heard them telling someone else. Usually, when someone asks me how I am doing while on yard sales, I say, “I’m here!” they like that. I always say good morning to them when I come up. Sometimes it helps me pick out who is running it. Once I said good morning to someone and he said I was the first person to say that and he would give me a deal if I got anything. Yard sales are hard work. Hauling the stuff out and later putting things back, and then you got those who want to haggle when you have a fixed price and you have idiots and bubbling fools coming by. I try to be pleasant at all times. 
It was a nice not to have millions of candidate signs out and about. One could actually see yard sale signs. While political season is entertaining, it does make things a real bother.

I decided to mow the lawn of Mom’s neighbor. The back really needed it. There was a section between the fence line and the hot tub slab that is near the property line. I decided I needed to hit that area. I had to work slowly as the weeds in back were long. I noticed that the back area which I never mowed was as high as the stuff in the rest of the lawn. I would push the mower into the “grass” and then back out then push it in. Some of the flower stalks of the weeds are stiff. I basically hacked at them with the mower, on the first pass then diced them up when I went over them again. Once I had cleared some area, I went back and forth. I had at least half an overlap of what I already mowed in order to get some more of the long stuff that was just knocked down. 
When I got to the back strip. I had to stop and move some pieces of wood, a piece of concrete and a brick. I then caught on something and it stopped the mower. It turned out to be a bundle of wire. I have no idea what it was too. I ended up pulling it out of the grass easily. It was like it was laid there and the grass grew over it. 
I went in and got an office chair and sat down, unplugged the lawnmower  and unwrapped the wire from the lawnmower blade. Other than one thick strand, they were all wrapped around one blade so I was able to slide it off the end of the blade. There was a lot of grass built up beneath the underside so I pulled a lot of that off. Some came in clumps but some I just left stuck to the plate. 
I finished that stretch of grass, then took a break. I went back out and finished the rest of the back yard except beneath the tree. The grass did not grow near as much there. I just hit two tall clumps and left it as that. The front yard needs to be mowed again. 

I baked one of the lasagna I made last week and we had that for lunch. There was one layer where I got the order of ingredients wrong, but it did not matter. I had used no-boil lasagna noodles and was afraid they would not get enough juice to soften. Other than that one layer separated from the rest, the lasagna came out really good. Mom liked it. The sauce is what makes all the difference in the world. I will not worry about any of the others. They will cook and taste good just as well. 

Right after lunch I headed for a mid day nap and really needed it. 



Year 18, Week 44, Day two (week 982)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-11-18 Sunday

We had some drizzles early morning but things dried out as the day got started.  Mom can wait a day or two before she has to water all the potted plants. 74 early morning 87 late afternoon. Clouds appeared and disappeared from time to time.. A breeze made it nice. 

I gathered all my dremmel equipment and basically dumped it out. Somehow I accumulated five dremmels. Two are single speed. One of them has a special power cord attachment that allows me to adjust the speed. 
After I dumped everything out, I started putting things back together. I actually did it wrong. I basically put it all together, rather than splitting them up between the different dremmel kits. I will have to dump things out again and split things up properly. 
I found things I forgot I had and found things I had searched for and figured I never had them. I found I had a lifetime supply of the little drum sanders and sanding sleeves. I have a lot of bits for holding cutting disks. In my search, I found one of the adjustable chucks that dremmel has. I now have four of the dremmels with an adjustable chucks.. One of the dremmels will have to work with the replaceable chuck jaws, where you pick it according to the diameter shaft of the bit. 

One of the wooden chairs I got at a yard sale or on the side of the road, I cannot remember which, had weathered so bad that mom removed the back and tossed the arch. She gave me the rungs. The tenons that went into the seat had rotted and would not hold. This chair had sat out in the weather in back all year long and it was not in great condition in the first place. I had repaired the back once. I had intended to do it better but never did. 
I sat on it today quite a few times. One time when I sat down, I turned and heard a crack. I changed chairs. The tenon holding the leg in the seat broke. Mom will toss the chair. We can get another some place if the opportunity comes up.
I considered making a chair like that but I am not out back long enough to make it worth the effort. 

I have a metal tool box for my main dremmel kit. I found I had half the lower area filled with bamboo and wooden dowels. There was a time I was making crochet hooks and kept the stock with the dremmel since I used the a cutting bit to carve in the hook on the rod. It was also a good place to keep the dowels from getting damaged. A couple months ago, I wished I had known the dowels were in there.  I put them in a temporary place.

I was done with the dremmel stuff about the time my brother was heading home. 
I wanted to work on ornaments but this felt like dealing with the dremmels needed to be done.  I brag about how far I am with my ornaments. That time disappears vaster than you would believe. 

 My brother made some hold downs for the mini lathe. He also gave me a bunch of different length screws with it so you use just the right size screws that don’t stick way up above the work you are holding onto . Some other week I will have to include pictures of these in use. Mom wants to build a lighthouse for in front of her house. She had one years ago, but it finally rotted and fell apart. My brother is going to make it out of sheet aluminum . 
       She and he were making a mock-up out of cardboard to see what it would look like. They designed it as a six sided light house, but in playing with it, they overlapped two sides and made it five sided and with their patterns, it developed a better angle/ they could use the pattern and made only five sides, or change the angle of the pattern and make it six sided. They will look at it and think about it over the week. 
       I will turn a disk that will be the walkway for it. I might try to talk mom into letting me turn the roof also. She has a large jar that will be the light, and will have a light inside, she will put in dowels and run wire or string between them for the rail. 

      My brother has a problem with his big machining lathe. There is no fine control when using it in the machine position, with the chuck facing down. He took a small hand crank grinder I had and is going to see if he can use it to give him fine gearing for the controls. He might cut it up, or he might disassemble it. He was looking at the crank drill press for this but the grinder seems better for his needs. 

        I have a turning club meeting this week on Thursday. I will show off my drum sticks since they were turned this month. This will be the last meeting of the year. We will have a party on December first, but won’t have any meetings until January. I have no idea where we will meet.

I will see what happens next weekend.

1846

My five demmels. The two on the left are single speed. the one on the far left has a special cord that has a slide switch to adjust the speeds. the second and third from the right has the chucks that have to have different inserts for different diameter bit shafts. the other three have chucks that go from wide to nothing. I later found another chuck.

A bun

A bunch of the stuff that was among my lathe boxes. all the wood on the right is stock for crochet hooks.

A mock-up of the lighthouse. they likely will make changes but this is good for the moment. 

Year 18, Week 43, Day One (week 981)

Year 18, Week 43, Day One (week 981)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-03-18 Saturday

72 low, 86 high, blue sky with puff clouds. Light breeze made it nice. This weather report is brought to you by The Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

We took a break after breakfast, and then went out to the Library book sale.  I looked at every title of cook book (looking for sauces) and examined at least the backs of every craft book and how-to books. Other than one humor books, mostly what I got was how-to and craft books. One really good one was about Aluminum. It was written back when that information was secret. Now I get to figure out where they go, at least for now.
Mom saw some model railroad and train books so she ended up going after lunch and picked up a bunch for a dollar a bag. 
They said these are books that are donated to t hem. I am assuming people dump their collections when they move or pass and then the library sells them for what they can. When they have their book sales. It is like Thursday, Friday and Saturday. They have an hour break for lunch. In the second half of the day they sell the books a dollar for whatever fits in a bag. I usually don’t see enough books of interest to take advantage of that. 
I told an old joke to them and they liked it. “You know you are a bad author when you donate your new publication to the library and find it in the next book sale.....”

I cleaned some of mom’s neighbor’s garage. I swept the floor and slid a home made cabinet into place. It did not move, but would rotate easily. I found that as I rotated it, If I pushed against it with my good knee, it moved easily. About for moves and it was in place. It just fits in place and the owner will have to find another place for other things he wanted to put in. Beside it. There is a whole lot more visible space in the garage now. Lots of stuff still piled up, but it is an improvement.

It was time to tackle some wood working. I strung a power strip with a short extension cord so it would hang from the awing pipe between the lathe and bandsaw and plugged t hem in. 
I first bandsawed two blanks for the tea pots as a test of concept. The bandsaw is so much nicer to work with than the gig saw. I drew a sort of circle on the corners and cut off the side corners, then cut straight in on each side of t he front and back corners, and then did a partial circle until the outer pieces came off. That left the spout and handle. This will work nice. I will make a bunch of them tomorrow.

I then mounted each of the drum sticks I started last week and worked them into the size and shape I wanted. I sanded them with course grit and then a finer grit.  I used the knife to shave/split off the excess wood on the end of one that had been left square. The other one was long enough to cut the worst of that end off before a little shaving to size. I remounted them into the lathe. The small end was stuck into the pipe that makes the drive head and that held it while I put the tail stock to the rough end and shave them into shape. 
I sanded them a lot by hand, washed them in water, which raised the grain, then sanded them again.  Then I gave them a vegetable oil coating which I rubbed in lightly. I did not have to add the oil but I decided it would look less like Mahogany if I oiled them. They look good.
Saturday Nights I go to a gathering where we have food and music. We have a semi-pro drummer there. I let him test these drum sticks out and he said they feel good and they sound good on the cymbals. That makes them good enough. 
I saw HOW IT’S MADE on TV where they made drum sticks. One episode was all automated, with almost no human handling. The drum sticks rolled down a rack into slot and the computer weighed each one. When they weighed the same, they would fall into a bin for packaging. The other episode was more hand made and a guy would weigh them until he got two that matched. 
My drum sticks are not that close. These are not the worst I made, but they do have different weights and when carefully examined, one is slightly bigger than the other. I could fix them later, but this is close enough for now.

I had to sharpen a couple of my tools. The edges are better but not right. One I did not quite do it right and could not use it. Because I did not properly sharpen the bowl gouge I was using, it did not quite cut right. I did get the wood off, though. It seemed to cut properly in only one position. I really need to take a day to clean and sharpen all my turning tools.

While working on the drum sticks. I had reached into the chuck to shave back more of the wood. On one drum stick that worked all right. On the second one, I did not have the bowl gouge in the right position, I reached in wrong and my attention was not quite on what I was doing. It caught and slammed down and off the tool rest. It “Bopped” my left thumb. The pain went away quickly, but I could still feel it in that spot in the evening if I pushed on it. You have to pay attention to what you are doing.  I needed a safe reminder. That, I hope, was it.

My mom had mentioned she was going to make some Spaghetti for Sunday. I wanted to make some Lasagna and her sauce is much better than mine. I brought my fixings to her and she cooked up a big pot of sauce. She kept a good amount for the lunch and I took the rest home. 

One of the problems with political season is there are so many signs out that yard sale signs are hard to spot. This time it seems that any clear three foot square piece of grass or dirt has a sign on it. 

I was on my feet a lot during the day and felt it when I napped about mid day. My leg cramped and my feet hurt. It was worth it, though, as I accomplished something. When I finally got up, my legs had no spring, but I was able to walk again.

I will see what I do tomorrow.




Year 18, Week 43, Day two (week 981)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
11-04-18 Sunday

72 low, 86 high, blue sky with lots of small and medium sized  puff clouds. Light breeze made it nice under the awning. It felt like it was not in the 80s, nice to just sit and talk. I don’t remember the sun being blocked. This weather report is brought to you by The Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

We had time change. I changed my watch but let my alarms stay at daylight savings time. Getting up an hour early today was not a problem.  I did run into a situation. I moved my watch the wrong way and the clocks looked wring. It was not until I looked on the computer that I found out why things were all wrong. Since I was getting up later, this was not a problem. It would have been bad if I had to get up earlier. That was a strange feeling. 

One of my other nephews from my sister’s side was supposed to come up with his daughter from another part of t he state and get their earlier than I normally do, so I left to get to Mom’s in time.  It ended up that he had a bad cold so he chose not to come. My brother was early, though.
I had gotten onto the bandsaw and made a bunch of blanks for the tea pots. It was a quick job. 

My brother came with a project he did during the week. He made a Cross Slide for my mini machine lathe. I could always go up and down the lathe like resizing a piece of rod, and I could go in and out, like you were cutting it off. The one thing I could not do is cut on angles in order to create cones or angles. The only way to do an angle was to “fudge” it, cutting in with tiny steps and then using a file to even out the ridges. 
My brother made a cross slide where it can go in and out on its own through a screw attached to the tool holder itself. One can rotate it on an angle and with just the knob on the tool holder, one can cut in and out on any angle. One can dish out the end of a piece or cut a nice accurate point on a bar.  This opens up all sorts of possibilities.  Now I have to remember what all those projects I wanted to do and could not do it at the time.
He happened to have a block of aluminum available so he used that. He was worried that it might break as aluminum is not as strong as steel. 
During our tests, it did all right. We were not putting it through a serous test, but it was a test to see if it worked. 

I then sat down and started carving teapots. I quickly found that I chose the wrong corner for the spout and handle. The way this wood was cut, was that the center was near one corner of the wood. The growth rings arc from one side corner to the other centered on the first corner. When I cut the tea pots. I decided to make the handles and spout on the corners based on the center. Once I started carving, I learned two things. One, the corners where the growth rings end are hard to cut. The other is that the corners radiating from the center split off easily. I quickly found that I could have saved myself a lot of effort if I used the other corner s for the spout and handle. I broke off a handle on two and one also lost a spout. I could have glued them on, but instead I just cut back farther until I had them again. It really does not effect the pot too much anyway. It might be oval but no one will really notice. 
I now have nine pots roughed out and four more blanks to go. I have ten gingerbread houses roughed out. that is a pretty good start for the first weekend of November. I am usually at this point at the end of November. It will catch up to me quickly.

My other nephew, the one that lives nearby, came with his wife and children. The youngest is about five and is energy looking for an outlet. When he was a toddler, my brother described him as having a high pain threshold and a short memory. That one was throwing my ornaments around and banging them. I got him away from them, and gave him two cut-offs of two by twos. He was suddenly in heaven. He could so anything he wanted to them. He banged them, he scraped them on a metal plate, he tried to pound a screw into one, he would throw them around. He had fun and did no damage. Those were the best toys I could ever have given him. 
I got the idea of making a set of “blocks” for him, the ones, twos, threes and fours, that he cold learn addition and subtraction with, and stack them and throw them. I will have to think about that. The two by twos are a bit big for such a project, though. 

For lunch, mom fixed a gigantic batch of shells in her sauce. It came out good.    After I got home, I made lasagna. I thought sure I would have lots of sauce left. I ran out. There is a way to layer the lasagna. A noodle, then the cheese (ricotta or cottage cheese), then your sauce and then your cheddar or American cheese, then repeat the layer. I made mistakes on some layering. I have these tiny foil loaf pans. They could be two servings with side dishes, or one serving as the main meal. I ended up making six of these lasagna. I ran out of the ingredients all at about the same time. I knew they use a lot of fixings but did not realize how much it took. 
I put all of them in the freezer and will bake them when I am ready to have them.  I figure that since they have to be thawed and heated anyway, it would not be too much bigger bother to bake them from scratch. 

My legs were complaining to me by the end of the day. It was, though, a very good day. I felt I accomplished a whole lot this weekend. 

I will see what I do next weekend.

2281

Black Walnut drum sticks with a vegetable oil finish. there are differences between them but not as bad as some I have made.

I had this clamping miter and decided to try it with the bandsaw. the cut off blocks were the squares the tea pots would be made from. I quickly found that this did not hold shorter pieces as the clamp was strictly over the miter slot.

some rough cut blanks for tea pots with a couple roughed out ones in back.

this shows the rings of the pieces of wood. the faces of the rings split out easily while the edges of the rings hold well. In this case, I broke off a piece from two of these as I was working with them.

My collect ion of blanks and roughed pieces. Every piece needs a lot of work to get them somewhat close to finishing..

the new cross slide my brother made for me out of aluminum. 

a better view of it. The cutting tool is sticking out on the right, next to the rod in the lathe chuck. the knob on the left moves it in and out. the nuts in a row just holds the tool in place when working. the knob facing us can lock it in place so it does not move. The nut on top holds it to the tool mount and has a head that fits in the slot below. My brother said that if t his breaks, he has the ketches and will make it out of steel rather than aluminum. 

Hey, I'm still here!

I figured it was about time I updated my status on this blog, since I'm the one who started the dang thing...😏

Well, my life has been busy these past few years. While I manage to sneak in a little hobby stuff in between writing and spending time with family, I don't always have time to write about it. Catch-22 of the bloggers world I guess.

Hey do you recall the old farmhouse we bought back in 2011? This is what it looked like back then:

Looks a whole lot better now! 

Costly but necessary improvements have been made: outside, inside, and all across the property. While we are in a lull right now (read that as can't afford sh*t) there are plans to continue the renovations. We're not doing this on what I'm making from writing, I can assure you that. 😞 But yes, the writing goes on, which is why I don't get to update any of my blogs regularly.

This blog is primarily about hobbies and interests outside the usual vocations. If you want to know about what I write, why, and with whom, I have two sister blogs you can read: WRITING FROM HOME and COMPANION DRAGON TALES. But right now, I want to talk crocheting!

Well mostly... 😉

I crochet most evenings while watching TV, after my day's work is done. That work I refer to might be writing on some days, babysitting and caring for my mother on others, and now and then I actually get out and shop, run errands, and go to appointments. I even do some housework. 😝 

Since I'm no longer getting around well due to a lot of arthritis pain and degenerative spine, I look forward to sitting in that easy chair and working on a project I can have in my lap or on a table before me. Since I have a ton of yarn and somewhere around 6-7 sets of crochet hooks, that's generally what I reach for.

Sadly all the thrift stores in my area have closed down, and I am just not up to wandering through flea markets or hitting yard sales. Maybe that's a good thing too, because this old house is not all that large and it has no closet space. The attic and cellar are both cold, damp, and unfinished. So the less clutter I bring home, the better.

I have done a heap of crochet projects over the last year or so. I only have pictures of a few right now, but there will be more forthcoming. Let's see what's sitting in the file...

It took me just over a month and a half to make the shield shaped backdrop and all the pieces I sewed onto it, but I made a Thanksgiving banner for my living room. Everything was done freeform, except the turkey, which came from a coaster pattern. Kind of primitive but I like it and the grandkids get a kick out of pointing out all the different things included. It was a challenge!

After that I started thinking about the Yule/Christmas season. I had made a bunch of crocheted ornaments for the tree the year before, but last year I wanted some banners for my kitchen. I've been on a roll lately with holiday banners and swags, so I started thinking about what would look good and be big enough to be seen. I settled on holiday trees and gingerbread cookie houses.

My tree blanks were first...

They are double thick, with each tree sewed together and the trunks added afterward. I looked at a couple patterns online, but made them in a way that looked best to me.

We had to have the pink and blue for the youngest grandkids. 

Once I had enough for a swag, I decorated them with bargain buttons I got on Amazon. I sewed the buttons on both front and back, going through both thicknesses of the trees at the same time. That way they are easier to attach and hide the ugly part of the stitching, as well as faster and somewhat symmetrical. I made a couple more of these in the traditional green to give away as ornaments in gift baskets and boxes for friends.

Here they are strung:

The buttons really make them pop, even with all the stuff in the background. That string they are on is a red imitation suede that is pretty sturdy and it's strung with alternating red and while pony beads for a candy cane look. I think it turned out pretty darn good!
Some closeups...

Yeah, I really should take those baskets and other stuff down and clean everything. Someday...


So then I went on to the gingerbread houses. I wanted them to look fancy too, but keep that gingerbread color. This is as close as I got to baking cookies last year. Hey they are high fiber, low carb, and have no sugar but a lot of love in the mix. 😏 

First the blanks. I tried to make the roof icing all look different.

Then it was on to the embellishments, which adorn both sides. I used buttons, peppermint chenille sticks (we used to call them pipe cleaners), and crochet to make each house unique. This was a good project for my collection of fancy wooden holiday buttons. I found the peppermint candy pattern online and made them with both red and white, and green and white yarn. If I find the pattern site again (I printed it up) I will link it because they make great ornaments and garlands by themselves. You use the two separate colors of yarn working first one and the other as you go along.

So here's the end result:

And some closeups. 

Please excuse the one with the wicked nasty cobwebs (they got cleaned right after I saw the picture, but it was too dark for another shot by then) and the fuzzy one that shows the other part of the room far clearer. I have a good camera but I don't pretend to be a photographer. I am also an indifferent housekeeper at best and this is an old house with its share of dirt and dust that is a never-ending battle. At 61, I'm just not embarrassed enough to delete those unfortunate pics. 😁

Same idea for stringing these, except that I used a green imitation suede strand with alternating green and white pony beads. I think those worked rather well!

So as I said, I decided to make some ornaments to go into gift boxes and baskets. I didn't make many, but they were a big hit. This is just a sample.

I was asked about the buttons, because as anyone who has shopped for them locally knows, they are costly! I often ask for Amazon gift certificates in lieu of gifts on holidays and birthdays, and that's when I do my craft supply shopping. I also hit the craft stores once in a while and pick up anything that looks interesting that I can get at a reduced or bulk price. Comes in handy when you have a project like this!

I don't recall where I got the snowman pattern, but the hats and scarves I just kind of cobbled together, and sewed them on. They are adorable!

Over the winter and into the spring and summer this year, I did quite a few crochet projects, many of which were functional as well as decorative in their own right. For instance, there were scarves for the small fry...

Nothing is more cheerful than a warm and bright scarf wrapped around your neck on a cold day. Thankfully I always have plenty of yarn on hand for these impromptu projects. These are long enough to allow some growing room. They went home with the grandkids.

Little grandson Zachary had informed me that he needed a 'rainbow' scarf. I figured his sister Terralyn (they are a year apart) might like one too, but I wanted them to be significantly different. So his is the dark colored one, and hers the pastel. This project made me smile because I remember making scarves for their daddy and uncle back in the day.


One does not disappoint one's grandchildren! 😎

Then it was on to afghans. I had wanted to try both a joined yo-yo and ripple pattern for quite a while, and so I decided to make one of each, and keep them the size that a little body could snuggle under and look at a book or watch a video on a tablet. Yes, they both have tablets, and those go everywhere with them, but both love books too, so Grandma keeps a small library of them here to browse through. Best of both worlds!

So here are the two afghans I made. No they were not blocked or washed at that point. They are medium throw size, really only lapghans, but they cover little bodies very well. They get used off and on while the kids are here. 

They were fun to make and the yo-yo strips attach as you go along. Zack got the ripple, Terra has the yo-yos. I did ripple edging on Zack's on the short ends and just rows of stitches down the long side. For Terra's edging I got creative and came up with something that turned out to look like cat faces up close. That makes it a conversation piece.

The closeup is blurry, but I think you get the idea.

Terra needed a doll blanket for a wooden crib someone gave her. She has a big baby doll at home that sleeps in it. So I got some measurements and whipped together this, in her choice of colors.

We must always have some shade of pink in everything she gets. She loves purple too, and some shades of blue, and anything sparkly. She's also a tomboy who wants to learn how to fix cars and stuff. Which is fine I guess, as long as you wear plenty of lip gloss and nail polish. 😄

While we're on the subject of Terralyn and blankets, she has a cloth blankie that used to be her mommy's that she totes around everywhere. It's just a small, square thing, stuffed with batting and the remains of previous incarnations, and it's been washed a bazillion times, so it was getting thin and ratty. So mommy decided it was time to recover it, and Terra and mommy went out and bought new fabric. 

Then I was asked if I could do the sewing... 😲 

Oh boy, I really stink with a sewing machine! But I said yes, because this is my granddaughter, my daughter-in-law wanted to preserve the blankie her grandmother made her, and well I love them all. So I did it.

And to my great relief, it came out fine! I left one part open so we could tuck in the old blankie (it was clean) wrapped in batting, then hand sewed that shut. We did that part in front of Terra at her house so that she could see that the old blankie was still inside the new one, so that she wouldn't cry for it. I mean, she's only 3; I've cried for worse reasons. I made temporary hand stitches here and there to hold it together until they brought it back over to my house. Then I went around the edging to make sure nothing shifts later, and added bar tacks to hold everything in place. So glad I didn't screw up this very important project! This is not my area of expertise.

Terra initially fussed about it, but she eventually got used to the idea and now she loves her 'new' blankie'. She's also getting older, and it isn't as big a deal as it was even 6 months ago. They grow up so fast! I'm just glad that maybe someday she can hand this one down to one of her own little ones. The heart of it is still the original blankie made by her mommy's grandmother, and fixed by this grandmother. Helping to carry the tradition onward means a lot to me. 💖One last afghan I did was a project I had bought at a flea market some years ago. It's a simple giant granny round, and the center light blue square and part of the blue ombre border around it was done. The rest was just yarn in a bag with it. So when that got dug out of storage, I decided to work it up, and here's how it turned out:

Nothing fancy, but a quick and easy project that worked up fast and was kind of mindless. Just big enough for an adult to snuggle under on the couch. I call this Big Brother Ben's blankie, for my 6"1', 14 year old grandson who occasionally graces us with his presence. He's a busy guy, so we are always happy to see him. Ben is Zack and Terra's older brother, in case you were wondering, but that is Lee holding up the afghan in the picture.Now and then I come across patterns that nag me to try them. These little owls had been in my file for quite some time, so I made a bunch of them. The nest was in the pattern too, but I could not figure that part out, so I just kind of cobbled this one together by holding two colors of worsted yarn on a bigger hook, and it works.

This is sort of a decorative piece that can be played with, and the grandkids love to make up stories about the owls, and then put them back to bed before they leave. I love those little ear tufts. I have a thing for owls.Same thing with the butterfly pattern, I'd had it for a while but never made them. So I made a whole bunch of them.

I saw online somewhere (likely Pinterest) that someone took crocheted butterflies and made a mobile with them. They were hung from monofilament fishing line strung with translucent colored plastic beads at increasing lengths and attached to a ring covered in crochet with flowers around it, with a similar but smaller ring above. I thought that was a great idea! That's the plan, though other project distracted me and I haven't gotten any farther than the butterflies yet. Though I will!That's about it for this post, but I hope you enjoyed it. There's a great satisfaction for me in being creative, watching a project unfold from basic concept to finished item. I hope you'll take some time away from your busy life and just sit and do something that makes you feel good. There's no pill or drink that can give you that kind of satisfaction. In a world that is sometimes filled with awful news and ugly situations, we need to bring forth a little beauty and whimsy now and then. Just to tip the balance our way again, you know? 😉Craft on,
~Nancy