Happy New Year!

It’s been a while since my last blog entry, and my only excuse is that the Holidays snuck up on me. We took off to exhibit in San Francisco, then it was off to Santa Fe and Grand Canyon for a well-deserved 10-day Christmas vacation. Now I’m back, with new ideas, new projects, and resolutions. Happy New Year!

It’s Showtime!

A long time ago (it seems), back around December 11-13, 2009, we went up to San Francisco and exhibited at the KPFA Craft &  Music Fair. This was my first time there, and it was a lot of work  for a two-day show. We did make a few sales, but, unfortunately, that weekend was a very wet one, with a huge Pacific storm dumping a lot of water and keeping many people away.

Fortunately, several of our old craft show buddies were also there, so we didn’t feel alone in a strange, new environment. (Exhibiting at a new venue is always stressful. Having friends around to give a little moral support helps relieve some of that stress.)

Several of our booth neighbors were very friendly, and we made some new friends, including a  fellow  from Burkina Faso who was helping out at a friend’s booth , who stopped by to show and play the African-style harp that he made. He played very well, and his instrument sounded wonderful. It made for a magical few moments out of three days of hard work.

More Showtimes!

For exhibiting in Galleries, December was a hoot! I send a piece, my Courting Dulcimer, to the international CraftForms 2009 show at the Wayne Art Gallery in Wayne, Pennsylvania, and two pieces, both birdhouse carvings, were accepted and delivered to the Santa Cruz Art League for the National Sculpture and Drawing Show. I’d been trying to get into the Wayne show for years. This year, my Courting Dulcimer was a hit, and they used it in some of their promotional literature. Fantastic!

Also, during December the woodworkers group I belong to, the Santa Cruz Woodworkers, got space in a new vacant building in downtown Santa Cruz to exhibit our work in window displays for the Holiday season. The Rittenhouse Building is on Pacific  Avenue, the main drag, on a prime corner right next to the big Cinema 9 building, a couple of busy restaurants, and the two-story parking lot where most park for downtown enjoyments. I just found out after I got back from vacation that we are going to be there through January. It’s a great promotional opportunity for our group.

A Southwest Holiday

I barely got back to work in my studio when we had to pack up again and head for Santa Fe, New Mexico, for a beautiful Southwest Christmas. We left on the Saturday after the KPFA show and drove for two days to get to Santa Fe. We shared a house with two friends who drove up from Phoenix. It was cold when we got there, and a couple of days later it snowed heavily. It was another magical time when we walked Canyon Road visiting galleries in the snow. Last year I had my first white Christmas while we were in Yosemite. This year, my second white Christmas (two in a row), was in New Mexico. Beautiful!

Just before we left, and on the spur of the moment, we decided to make a stop at the Grand Canyon. I checked online and found a room available at the Yavapai Lodge, which was 1/4 mile from  the south rim. More magical moments. The Canyon rim was covered with around a foot of snow, and the temperature was as low as it was in Santa Fe (around 10 degrees or so). We had a wonderful dinner at the Bright Angel Lodge at a window table overlooking the canyon, then a fantastic breakfast at the old Fred Harvey built El Tovar, also at a window table overlooking the canyon. After breakfast, we hiked about a mile along the rim from El Tovar to Maricopa Point, where the wind-chill factor seemed like zero degrees. We stayed at the Grand Canyon until nearly 1 pm, when we knew it was time to leave and head home.

Back in the Studio

Well, we’re back now, and we rang in the New Year last night by drinking a glass of bubbly around 9:30 or so and going to bed before midnight. On New Year’s Eve day, I started gearing myself up for a New Year of projects, old and new. The old ones, which I’ve been working on for quite a while, are starting to take shape and look more complete. New ones, which I’ve been thinking ab0ut and planning for a few months, are beginning to take shape. My Starnina Harp,which had been in and out of process for over two years, is finally nearing completion, if I can ever finish the head carving. The Portative Organ is kind of on hold, while I finish the  White Lady dulcimer and the three-legged stools. And today, I started on the first chess piece carving. I almost finished it in one day. It just needs a little clean-up and sanding. (Only 31 more to go.)

Anyway, after that much needed vacation in the Southwest snow country, I’m rested and ready to carve. Onward through the fog!

Welcome to My Workshop—Part 3

It always seems that during the two to three weeks in October I’m set up for the Open Studios Art Tour, and my work slows down so as not to dirty things up too much (and sit around waiting for customers), I not only think of new things to work on, but also on how to improve my workshop/studio.

One thing I’ve always wanted to do was improve dust collection. I already have a filter to capture the dust as I carve, but my power tools never had permanent hookups to a dust collector. In the near and distant past, I hooked a shop vacuum directly to my power  tools. This method, even though it worked, constantly clogged up the vacuum’s filter, and I had to clean it almost every day.

Well, this year at Open Studios, I decided to connect all my power tools to a central vacuum and dust collection system. Since my workshop is so small, a regular dust collector with 4” hoses would take up so much room, I wouldn’t have space to work. Fortunately, a company known for industrial dust collection, Oneida,  invented a small cyclonic separator that fits between a regular shop vacuum and the power tools. So now I’m connecting all my tools with 2” to 2 1/2” hose and blast gates to my new separator and vacuum. (A new vacuum, by the way, since my other one died a couple of weeks ago.)

On another shop tool front, as I mentioned in a previous blog entry, I got a bed extension for my mini wood lathe. To install it, I had to move my scroll saw to where the sharpening station sat, and then I had to make a new space for the sharpening  station in a lesser used space on one wall. My workshop is evolving little by little.

Meanwhile, On the Workbench

I’m not spending all my time trying to improve my shop, I’m actually working on several concurrent projects. My main goal is to have my new dulcimer, “The White Lady”, finished for the KPFA Crafts & Music Fair in San Francisco’s Concourse Exposition Building, December 12th and 13th. No pictures yet, she has some surprising carvings I’ll show when she’s completed.

The Starnina Harp is coming along. I’m adding segmented binding to the both ends of the body. Once the binding is complete, it will be time for me to lay out the top for  soundholes and strings. This has been another long project that changed from one style to another then to the current style in the two years since I started planning it. I think this is the one that’ll go. In the meantime,  I still need to finish carving the lovely lady who’s adorning the front of the peg block.

The Chapter House Portative Organ is also coming along—slowly. I started laying out and fret sawing the first of three pipe holders, but it’s a slow process.  Like I said, there’s three of them to do, and the outside two are much more intricate—and with some of my infamous carvings. Stay tuned.

One of my new directions is the study and making of medieval furniture. My first effort is coming along nicely. I’ve turned several test pieces for a three-legged stool, and I’m planning other styles of furniture. Hopefully, I’ll have a couple of  new items to show and to compliment my medieval instruments at the Scottsdale Arts Festival next March.

Finally

The Holidays are almost upon us, and there’s quite a bit happening and possibly about to happen with me and Ron Cook Studios: gallery shows and newsworthy tidbits. More on this will be in my Holiday Newsletter, which will be popping up in your e-mail box in a few days. If you’re not on my e-mail list, and want to receive my quarterly newsletter, go to my website and sign up at the bottom of the home page.

Today is sunny and a little cool, but perfect for being in my workshop with the door open to our garden.

No fog this time of year to be onward through…