Our kids: Leah & family

Leah, Morton and Max live in Denmark. Most of these pictures were taken when they visited us a couple of years ago.

Max is now nearly 3 years old and waiting for his new baby brother to arrive.

See Leah's blog listed at the top of our home page.

Our kids: Scott & family

Jake's 1st birthday.

I took these videos on my last trip to Las Vegas in May. The video of Taylor shows her jumping with "Moon Shoes", which are like mini trampolines strapped to her feet. The video of Hunter was taken when he was playing Super Sheriff. He had on a little plastic helmet that wouldn't stay on his head, so he has to hold it on while he runs after the ball.

It's amazing how fast kids grow, especially when you only see them infrequently. Taylor is becoming a young lady, Hunter is 90 miles an hour the minute he wakes up and Jake is developing his own impish personality.

Scott and his wife, Lindsay live in Las Vegas, where Scott is currently the General Manager of a Honda car dealership.

Arizona sunsets

OK, I'm a sucker for stunning sunsets in Tucson. I never get tired of the endless designs offered by the cloud formations and the sun's angle.

Arizona sights- Salt River

About three hours Northeast of Tucson is the Salt River Canyon. I think it's one of the most beautiful places on earth. It has all the features of the Grand Canyon (also in Arizona) but compressed into a much smaller ares. It's almost sensory overload!

A popular activity in the summer is to ride rubber tubes down the river. It's about a 5 hour ride past some of the most beautiful scenery anywhere. Temperatures in the summer are about 75 Farenheit, with water being about the same.

Arizona sights - Picture Rocks

Not far from our house is a huge wash where hundreds of years ago, Indians used to carve objects in the rocks. Not surprisingly, it's called Picture Rocks. This wash runs for miles and carries storm runoff from the steep mountainsides flanking it. In many places the wash is 50 yds wide. So much water will gather off the mountains at one time, that a wall of water 10 feet tall, moving at speeds of 60 mph are not uncommon. The Model T in the picture apparently couldn't get out of the way.

The first group of pictures are of the spring wildflowers this past spring (08). We had ample rain over the winter and that always triggers a glorious display of flowers.

Git er done!

Finally, the backyard porch is finished. I built the deck quite a while ago and didn't plan on railings. However, my Mom is coming to visit in December and at 92 years old, will need the railings to help negotiate the steps.

The porch is 4 1/2 feet deep and 6 1/2 feet wide, so there is ample room to manuver while opening the door. The railings should have been a pretty straight forward build, but when I built the deck, I wasn't planning on them so no provisions for railings were in the design. It took a lot of modifications just to get the porch ready to accept the railings.

But, it's done and they're sturdy.

Wooden bowls

I call this one Ethan Allen meets the southwest. The reddish Padauk and the black Wenge give
an elegant air, while the feature ring of Poplar suggests a Southwestern theme. It has 420 pieces
and is 8" wide by 8" tall.
Winner's Cup
This one was a challenge! It has 318 pieces but with 120 of them in the feature ring. Each segment of the feature ring had to be assembled from 10 tiny pieces, then glued together. Very time consuming. Also, the near-horizontal top was very delicate to cut. Made from 3/4" Padauk, the ending thickness was 3/16th", due to the angle. The top 4 rings were turned separately, because the neck was too small to access the inside with a lathe tool. A dado was cut in both the top section and the bottom section and the two were joined for the final touches.

The bowl is made from Wenge (dark wood), Padauk (reddish wood), Poplar (white wood) and Yellowheart. It is 8" wide and 8" tall.


This was made for my cousin Judy in Wisconsin. It's 198 pieces of Purpleheart, accented with
Yellowheart, Poplar and Wenge wood. It is 8.5" wide and 9" tall.


My last bowl. It's made from 606 pieces of Padauk (the red) and Poplar wood, with 444 pieces
in the feature ring alone. It's 8.5" wide and 9" tall.


The bowl above is made with Bocote, a hardwood from Central America & Mexico, with
an accent of Basswood. Basswood is a soft wood found in the USA. It is 6 3/4" tall and 7 1/4
wide.



This bowl is American Walnut with accent rings of Padauk, from West Africa. It has 216
pieces in it and measures 6 1/2" tall and 6 3/4" wide.


This one of my favorite bowls, but sadly I can't make any more like this. It's primary wood
is Birdseye Maple, which I'm VERY allergic to. I knew that before I made it, but decided I
would tolerate the penalty in order to achive the look I wanted for this bowl. Birdseye Maple
has a quality that looks like satin and is very elegant.

The accent ring is a combination of Wenge (Africa), Padauk (Africa) and Yellowheart (Central
America). This bowl also has 216 pieces in it and measures 7" tall and 7" wide.


This bowl is primarily Lacewood (Australia) with accents of Wenge (Africa) and Birdseye Maple
from Northeastern USA. It has 120 pieces and measures 5 3/4" tall and 6 3/4" wide.


When cutting segments for a bowl ring, two or three test cuts are made before the tolerance is finally set. These pieces get tossed into a box where they have accumulated into quite a number. I decided to try and make something from them and devised a way to cut the small pieces even smaller without losing any fingers. The result is the bowl shown above, made for an old Marine Corps buddy. It only has 108 pieces, but the wood is Bubinga, Canarywood, Padauk and Bloodwood. I think it turned out to be a pretty piece.

I call this one the Leftovers Bowl. I took all the various strips of wood left from other bowls, glued them up and turned them into an urn. There are 378 pieces in this bowl.

Anniversary bowl made of 378 pieces of British Cherry, with dark accents of Wenge and a feature ring of Padauk and Basswood.



13.5" diameter serving plater made of 78 pieces of Purpleheart and Yellowheart.
I made this bowl for my niece in Wisconsin. It has 240 pieces of Padauk, Yellowheart and Purpleheart wood.
















Block bowl has 504 pieces, 340 in the feature ring alone. Wood is hard Maple, Wenge and Padauk.












I tried to put three different colored woods together so that when turned down, two colors would show on the outside and two opposite colors would show on the inside. It almost worked.

This one flew off the lathe and broke into pieces. I was able to rebuild the feature ring and complete it. I call it the Resurection Bowl.
















What do you do with some left over pieces? Glue them together and make a goofy bowl out of them.

The big white bowl is another one where the lathe's mounting block (MDF) came apart and the bowl flew up and gave me a good shot to my face shield. It suffered enough damage to the feature ring such that there wasn't enough wood left to finish the inside portion. The thickness of the wood on the zig-zag is about as thick as a match book cover.

I think this was one of the first bowls I made.

Another early bowl.

This bowl has 216 pieces in it, from 5 different woods.

The purple bowl is one of my favorites. The wood is Purpleheart and Yellowheart. Both are relatively soft and turn easily.

I had a piece of redwood, so I made a small vase.

The bowl above was made by glueing alternate strips of red and white wood into a solid block. Then rings were cut from it, stacked up and glued together.

This bowl was made for our daughter, Leah. As she lives in Denmark, I put some Southwest Indian blanket designs in it.

This was made for my Sister-in-law, Jude. It's made with a Walnut base, Bubinga body and Zebrawood feature ring.

This was one of my first segmented bowls. It is now a cookie jar but looks like Pooh Bear's honey pot.

Another attempt to turn three layers of wood. This time trying to make footballs on the outside and basketballs on the inside. It worked,but the balls were different sizes due to the ring being slightly out of round.

This one features Bubinga wood (dark) and Basswood. Bubinga is also known as African Rosewood. It usually turns and finishes nicely, but I have had some that gave me fits.

Pot bellied bowl has bubinga, purpleheart, basswood and an oak base.

This is another cookie jar I made for my sister, Marlene. The wood is Bubinga, Walnut, Basswood and Purpleheart.

I call this my "4 bowl" because one of the design segments was cut and glued up backwards. I didn't see it until the bowl was completely finished.
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This all started when I bought a small lathe a couple of years ago and started turning custom pens. That led to turning candleholders and then I discovered segmented bowls. I turned a few of those and found that I really enjoyed the challenge they presented in the precision required to make all the little pieces fit. But the small lathe limited their size to a maximum of 6 inches.

Last spring, I bought a full sized lathe and now I'm able to turn any size bowl my imagination can create. I was surprised to discover that the larger the pieces, the more precise the measurements must be. That led to having to engineer some jigs for cutting and shaping the segments.

All the bowls pictured here are made of exotic woods. Domestic wood just doesn't have the proper graining or texture that is necessary for good fit. The exceptions are walnut and maple, which turn beautifully.