Princess Pen Blank

Creating a pen blank perfect for a princess.  The recipient picked out the princess pen kit and it is shown with a white pearl blank that has swirls of gold and black.  Can’t wait to see this one cut into blanks.

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Silver Mica Powder

Silver mica powder is a lot more opaque than you would think.  It creates a dove grey color when completely mixed in.  This moment is what creating blanks is all about.  The energy, the movement, the possibilities.  Let’s all just take a minute and stare at it in silence.

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Galleries

Check out some of our creations!

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Corn Cob Pens

Four Corn Cob Pens

Yes, corn cob pens!  I’ve made a dozen or so of these over the years, they are very popular around here.  We recently brought a bunch of pens in to Legacy Outfitters, a store in Logansport that sells items made by local artists and craftsmen, and several of them sold.  One of these was a corn cob pen.  The customer who bought it asked if I could make three more.  So here they are being made.

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Some Acrylic Pens and a Wood One

Here are a handful of pens we turned.


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Island Legs

Kitchen Island Legs

One of the things about little local craft shows is that you might not sell much. You might spend a lot of money on a booth. You sit there all day peopling. You have to pack and unpack and sometimes drive down many a long and winding road. And it all seems like you do it for nothing. I won’t try to tell you that you will always make back what you spent on the booth, drive, and all the food you ate at the venue. It takes some tweaking to find your market and what types of events work best for you. That being said even though you don’t sell at the event you need to get busy handing out your cards, talking to people, make sure that you have interesting things for them to look at and talk to you about.

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A Couple of Acrylic Bolt Action Pens

Two Bolt Action Pens

Two Bolt Action Pens

As I mentioned in this article, Sam likes the acrylic pen blanks. He’s wanted to turn these for a while, so we did a little reorganizing in the shop, and made our turning area a little bigger.

We brought the Rikon lathe down from the basement studio, and set it up next to the Jet lathe.  We set up the counter next to his lathe with all of the pen turning equipment and supplies.  Continue reading

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Size Matters

The Big Shop

When we were first planning out the new shop a major consideration was size. The idea of a shop started in a rental townhouse which had a barely functional one car garage. It was big enough to hold the small pool table that I and my two brothers-in-law were rebuilding. That table was not salvageable but it built a relationship between us that has stood the test of time.

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Spheres

Cherry Sphere

One thing I’ve wanted to try turning for a long time is a sphere. I love the simple elegance of them.  It seems to me that if you are turning things round on a lathe, the ultimate round is a sphere.  Sounded like a good project to try in the Small Shop.

My first sphere is the cherry sphere above.  I did not photograph the creation of this one, as it was a learning experience.  But all in all, it was very successful.  I learned a lot and was very pleased with the results.

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Cherry Rolling Pin

I like turning rolling pins.  Maybe it’s because of the unique challenges they present, like making a perfectly uniform cylinder.  Maybe it’s because Marisa makes many fabulous baked creations with them, like pizzas, pies, and potica.

I made this one because we didn’t have one in Michigan.  This became the first project I made in the Small Shop.

Cherry Rolling Pin

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