Update on 2014

Well, so far this year, things haven't turned out as I planned in my last posting.  Early this year I was diagnosed with cancer in a couple of places and in February I had an operation to remove it.  The operations was, by all accounts, successful, but it did take me out of the shop for the better part of four months.  As a result, I haven't gotten very much done on the goals I set out for the year.  Needless to say, when next January rolls around, much of what I planned will remain undone.

Still, I have done a few things.

• Jeff Fleisher and I introduced our new birdcage awls and began selling those via the web.  Sales have been very good.  We continue to sell our Shenandoah Mallets as well.
• Jeff and I are signed up to have a vendor booth at this year's Woodworking in America, which will be held in Winston-Salem, NC, September 12-14.  We will be busy this summer producing enough stock to meet the expected demand for our awls and mallets.
• I built a bird's mouth fixture to use with my turning saw.  I purchased that from Tools for Working Wood at last year's Woodworking in America.  I can't say I've learned to use it effectively yet; that remains an objective for this year.
• I built a pair of shop bents to go with my sawbench.  For these I used salvaged Douglas fir from stairsteps that were replaced in our house.
• I resumed teaching at Woodcraft the other day with my Handplane Basics class.  That is a milestone for me on my road to recovery and I will now be able to teach the other classes I'm planning to conduct.
• I installed my new General router table.  I got the one with the cast iron table.  The router is also new, the 3 1/4 hp Porter Cable router, which should give me all the power I'll need.

I'll still work on the other projects I proposed for this year, though my emphasis will be on preparing to teach several new classes.  For those, I need to first build the projects we will be building in class so I am fully prepared to teach them effectively.  I do want to finish the bedside tables and the natural edge walnut coffee table, at a minumum.  And, I'd like to build a Greene and Greene style clock based on plans from a November 2010 Wood Magazine article.  Other projects may simply have to wait until next year!

Norm