Post Christmas

My wife and kids and I exchanged gifts at my grandparent's house on Christmas Eve because my uncle and his wife were in town. My grandparents are the only close family we have locally do we usually spend the holidays with them. That left Christmas day open so I spent a couple hours in the shop.









These Olive hollow forms had their exteriors roughed out a couple weeks ago, the insides were rough hollowed on Christmas day. As with most of my turnings they are now bagged and shelved for at least 6 months.












I'm preparing for a lidded boxes demo next month and saw a left over piece of Banksia pod. Instantly I knew what I wanted to do. One of the boxes I'm planning to demo is this style, I call them pill boxes and they're made with an inlay of contrasting wood; in this case Holly inlay in the Banksia pod body and lid.









These are kind of fun to make, I've done them in Box Elder Burl, Olive, Walnut, Myrtle, mesquite, Honey Locust, and more. Inlays are usually African Blackwood or Holly. Sometimes I make a separate handle, others the lid/handle are a single piece.












The body is mostly round. There is a small depression in the bottom center so it will sit flat and stable. This was my first time making a box out of Banksia, it won't be my last.

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Banksia

Next month is our club's annual holiday party. As part of the festivities we have an ornament exchange. Everyone wanting to participate brings in a wrapped Christmas ornament and exchanges it for a raffle ticket. The last couple of years we've done white elephant type exchanges where stealing is allowed. This year I chose to do one out of Banksia pod and Holly. I did a rough sketch this afternoon and then headed to the garage this evening to make it a reality. It's very close to what I had envisioned and should be pretty popular.

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This post is actually a couple of evenings work put together. On Saturday night I did a new handle for the gavel. It's almost exactly the same length, it's just thicker and the threads have a slightly different configuration. The length was dictated by the length of the blank, it could stand to be another inch or two longer but this was almost all I have of this species.

On Sunday I decided I wanted to turn a matching sound block. I had saved a small piece of the matching wood just for this purpose. It was Approx. 3" X 3" X 1/4" so I knew I'd want to inlay it into another blank.

My first choices were Walnut and Mesquite but I wanted more contrast. I ended up selecting some Holly I've had for a while.

I wasn't sure how I was going to shape the profile, I ended up doing the same basic profile as the gavel itself. The underside of the Holly is hollow so there is a bit of a drum effect

Day 8: Experimenting continued

Holly lidded bowl with color continued - bottom side is complete.

Top side complete.

Both halves sitting open.  Only 2 colors of dye were used.  The magenta centered half (top) had the dye applied with a rag.  The aqua centered half (bottom) was dyed using an airbrush.

Profile view.  My intent was to have the rim curve back up so you could squeeze both halves of the rim together to force the box open on the opposite side.  My son says it looks like a UFO.

Day 7: experimentation

While picking my son up from school today I had a long wait in line so I took out a notebook and started to sketch.  I had an idea for a clamshell style box and set to work on it this evening.  This is the top half of that box with the inside of the box dyed blue and magenta.  The rim and the outside will not be dyed.

The bottom of the box, the inside will also be dyed.

The top of the box has been placed on the bottom.  this is similar to how the box will look when closed.