February 2023 Newsletter

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 who I had not seen for many months. It was also really good to see a few different faces participate in the “Show-N-Tell” portion of the meeting.

The worst part of attending through Zoom – I don’t get to visit with those attending in person. I plan to be there in person for the March meeting.

A big thank you to Dave McBride for hosting the meeting.

I hope you enjoyed Ron Zdroik’s demonstration as much as I did. The whimsical “out of this world” flowers and the painting and resin techniques all involved skills and techniques that can be applied to other items.

Here are some upcoming events to put on your radar:

2023 AAW Symposium – The 2023 Symposium will be in Louisville, KY on June 1-4, 2023. That is less than 7 hours away by automobile. If you plan to attend it is time to get your hotel reservations made. IF (note the IF) there are 10 or more members who want to register together that qualifies for a $40 discount per ticket ($315 in place of $355). Chapter members also need to be AAW members. The registrations need to be placed together and paid with a single check so it requires some coordination to get this done. Let me know if you are interested. There is a page on the AAW Website with more information. So far, only one person has contacted me.

Woodworking Show – most everything is in place for the booth at the Woodworking Show that will be held at the Milwaukee County Sports Complex (6000 W Ryan Rd, Franklin, WI 53132) on February 17-19.

Greg Richter may still need a few people to man the “Tunnels to Towers” booth for the Woodworking Show. Your job would be to help people turn a pen, sand it and finish it with a friction polish. You do not need to be an MAWT member to help with this booth. Please contact Greg if you can help.

If you can’t assist in a booth but want to attend the show, discount tickets are available for the show through their website.

Midwest Penturners Gathering – The 2023 gathering is to be held on April 21-22 and is within driving distance of Milwaukee, at the Mariott Northwest in Hoffman Estates, IL. The website for the show states: “And This Year We Are Adding Other Small Turnings.” Cost is $49 if paid beforehand or $59 at the door.

Other Items:

January Meeting – the Gallery and the Meeting Recording from the January meeting have been published. Both are at the top of the pages linked.

Board – Please join me in welcoming Kevin Seigworth to the Board of Directors. We could still use one more member to bring us up to a full board.

Dues – If you have not yet paid your dues for 2023, please do so soon. If you do not plan to renew your membership for 2023, a email to George W would be highly appreciated. Later this month we will be purging the mailing list and removing those members who have not paid their dues for 2023.

Web Site – I plan to make some changes to the web site in the next couple weeks. Most of these changes will be behind the scenes, but if you happen to visit the web site and things look a little wonky, it is because things are in flux. If you have talents in this area that you would like to share, please contact me.