We had a great demonstration with Keith Gotschall on Monday night (6/3/24). We had 26 or so members in the meeting room and 12 or so on line for a total of about 40 in attendance. Those who attended on Zoom may not have realized that we were having technical issues with the sound in…

This was written over 10 days ago and I never got it published… It was good to have a somewhat normal meeting this month. The “somewhat” is because the scheduled demonstrator could not be there because of circumstances beyond his control, so we decided to hold an extended show and tell. The recording of that…

Hi – it’s been too long since we have published any updates about the Milwaukee Area Woodturners. Since the last newsletter, a number of things have occurred… Welcome new members!! – between the Woodworking Show and the Alan Lacer weekend we have gained a few new members for 2024. March Meeting – In late February…

Thanks to Dennis Motl for some sound woodturning advice at the February meeting. Although Dennis touched on many subjects, much of the knowledge he shared was good basic stuff. I have written about one particular line that he used in another post which will be part of the email that shares this newsletter. The bottom…

One of the things that Dennis mentioned really rang a bell with me personally, which is “Don’t let the person with the saw determine the size (and shape) of your project.”  I know that when I started turning, sourcing wood was one of the largest concerns that I had. I was under the mistaken impression…

We had another good turnout for our January meeting and I know we had a number of participants on the Zoom meeting. We had a number of Instant Gallery items – Tom Hipsak took pictures – we will be posting those when he gets them processed. The meeting was recorded – to view it click…

I’m sorry I ran out of time for the demonstration Monday night. Here are some highlights of my thinking that you may find useful. I think the challenge of making a peppermill can be divided into three parts: layout, drilling and design. Each comes with their own challenges. Layout The primary challenge to laying out…

Hi Everyone: If you weren’t able to attend the 2023 December Holiday Party you missed a great time! We had a great turnout with lots of great food and fellowship! There was a gift exchange and a door prize drawing. If you were there it was great to see you!  NOTE: For our January 2024…

November Meeting: We had a great turnout for our November meeting – between those present at the Woodcraft meeting room and the online participants we had almost 60 people in attendance.  Terry Alby, Kevin Seigworth, Ron Zdroik and Steve Fosticz made a very enjoyable and informative presentation. From finding wood, to cutting it up and…

Our meeting date came early this month – on October 2! Coupled with the late date last month due to the Labor Day holiday – the two meetings came close together. The club was active this past month, however, with two events occurring between the two meetings. First, on September 23 we had a Workshop…

September Meeting We had a great meeting on September 11. David Landers did a great job of helping us understand how to think out of the box and how to use bowtie inserts (pewas) for both structure repair and for decorative purposes on turned hollow forms. I have been putting a lot of thought into…

Thank you to everyone who participated in the Show-N-Tell at the meeting on August 7. The meeting was recorded and the recording is ready for viewing at the top of the Video page. I know Tom Hipsak took pictures of most of the items and they will be added to the Gallery when they become…

June Meeting Thank you to Dennis Clayton for an in-depth coverage of photography at our club meeting in June. Dennis showed a number of different techniques, all aimed at recording your wood art with artistic photography. I’ll be trying some of his techniques with my photography. Dennis’ presentation reminded me that photography is an art…

Can you believe it is May already? We are already over a third of the way through the year! This should have come out this morning (Sunday, 5/7/23) but I forgot to “publish” it so you will be seeing it Monday morning at the earliest. If you weren’t able to join us for the May…

We had a successful open workshop on April 15, with several participants and the perfect number of mentors, and even a couple observers. We shared the space with the Guild and made a lot of (mostly yellow) wood chips. Here are a few cell phone snaps of some of the participants. We plan to hold…

I apologize for taking this long to get the newsletter out. I’m not sure if it is an excuse or a reason, but we had a busy Easter weekend and then the weather turned beautiful and we have been busy in the yard and the garden. However, if I don’t get this done soon, it…

There are a number of items I forgot to mention in the Newsletter 2023 AAW Symposium The Symposium is in Louisville Ky, right at a 7 hour drive from Milwaukee. I know we have some members going. If we can register 10 or more chapter members (who must also be AAW members) we can get…

Wow!! What a great attendance for our March meeting – I counted about 55 persons in attendance and there were over 10 on the Zoom meeting. It was great to see everyone. Jim Stephan made a great presentation on using different sizes of the skew chisel to make a gnome. I expect to see lots…

The Video for the February Meeting is posted at the top of the Demo Videos page.

Greetings everyone! It was nice to be able to participate in the meeting the other night. I have heard there around 50 people in attendance at Woodcraft!! And there were about 10 attending through Zoom, including myself. I couldn’t see who all was there in person, but I saw at least one person in attendance…