Good Monday Morning!

Good Monday morning Patriot Woodworkers! What did you get done over the weekend, and what have you planned for the week ahead! Inquiring minds want to know. Please tell us what's happening in your shops, your life, and any events going on with you. Thank you for being here folks!

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I found Brent Hull a few months ago and was fascinated by his observations.

Brent Hull is an award-winning master builder and expert in historically accurate architectural millwork and moldings. For over thirty years his craftsmanship has enhanced nationally registered properties and homes across the country. Hull honed his expertise at Boston’s North Bennet Street School where he trained in the art of traditional building and historic preservation prior to founding Hull Millwork & Hull Homes in Fort Worth.

The Industrial Revolution changed more than how we built, it changed the role of the craftsman. With the steam engine came new tools, new methods, and mass production. Master craftsmen gradually became installers, and the knowledge once passed down through the trades began to disappear.

Good Morning yourself John.

Enjoying what will probably be the last 80 degree day here "Two Weeks From Anywhere".

So I'll be going outside to play!

List of things i need to do: quite long

List of things i want to do: quite short.

Rained over the weekend- 2.5" from remnants of the hurricane.

Looks like the garden might be done by next weekend's weather. The "icebox" of PA is considered the Bradford area. Next weekend the temperature there is to be 25° with snow flurries so we will surely have a heavy frost

5 hours ago, DAB said:

List of things i need to do: quite long

List of things i want to do: quite short.

For some strange reason, I can relate.

Lately I've used my workbench and woodcraft skills in assembling custom boxes to store / transport canvases I paint and sell locally. The Priority Mail Shoe Box is my starting point. Cut to dovetail together. Glue, clamps, weights, and 'helper blocks' to hold back.

A properly-sized block of wood inside a box under a 4x6 piece of 1" steel makes for a proper glue joint as I assemble three boxes into one ≈ 5" x 7" x 45" rectangular "tube".

Woodcrafts come into play in sales. A nice customer sometimes gets one of the longleaf trays, as I disburse my 2024-2025 woodcraft output 🎁

I'm still working on my second table. Here I'm making the top.

On 10/13/2026 at 1:39 AM, Woodman said:

canvases I paint and sell locally.

Woodman I had no idea your artistry wasn't limited to woodworking, that is some impressive work you are doing, ya know, just when you think ya know a guy 😄

On 10/15/2026 at 11:04 AM, John Morris said:

that is some impressive work you are doing,

Thank you! I take glue-reinforced boxing seriously! 😁 I'm gluing up a dedicated clip box now, with strengthened lip. It'll make vend set-up more enjoyable, I'm sure.

Other woodcraft tied to the art: I display in an area park, using the perimeter fence, and cut long thin slats of longleaf pine of appropriate length to easily clip to the finials with large stationary clips. Then clip the art to the slats. Plus a few thin ply panels, to raise the art 7"-12", to keep it off the fence curb AND further from area dogs when the dogwalkers are inattentive. Dogs love peeing on a granite fence curb, paintings or not.

• In addition but not lastly, I cut masks from wine crate lids to mask off areas of a painting, instead of using tape. Leaves a more organic edge, should brush or palette knives wander. More importantly and usually, it keeps errant paint off the canvas. I hate 'correcting' stray paint; it is always visible.

A couple pics: park vending, and one of yesterday's typically-happy customers (she's a psychologist with a Ph.D. and the painting is for her office; she got a discount]

[cue music: Beatle's 'Baby, You're a Rich Man"]