I had the best birthday I ever had.

 

For the first time I corralled my lovely little granddaughters into the shop to make a couple of hot plate fish shape trivets for their mother. She'd been feeling poorly and I told the little girls that there's nuthin in the world that makes a mommy feel better about things than gifts from their babies that were made by their babys hands with love care and diligence.

 

So we selected from shapes of fish I snarfed off the WWW and got some apple and maple logs (yes that's right we started with logs - short ones, but logs just the same) and resawed and jointed and planed and  ripped strips and crosscut pieces of the contrasting color wood.

Then we  glued up the pieces and left them over night and the next day - - -

 

Yah it was a two day job.

 

The next day we changed the band saw blade together and I showed em how to transfer laser printouts to wood using acetone then with the fish images properly transferred I held them close with my hands on theirs and  guided them while they took their work pieces and sawed the fish shapes out on the band saw.

 

Then it was off to the bench for an hour or so of sanding and stroking with files and wood shaped and strips to get the edge contours just right.

And they signed them with a wood burn in a discrete place.

That night we all had a birthday / new years eve party.

It was the best birthday ever.

 

And of course mommy was most pleased.

Happy belated birthday! Those are some really neat trivets!! Tell the girls they did a fantastic job!!

Happy belated birthday. Fantastic job those girls did. Great experience with the grand kids, I am jealous.

Happy belated Birthday Cliff and those are absolutely cool. What a great time in the shop with the granddaughters. Not only is it a special gift for mommy, but a special memory for granddad also.

Neat way to get them woodworking.

 

 

 

Any time you can pass you skills along it is a great day. When you can pass them off to your family then it is spectacular!

If anyone had told me when I was in my 20s how much I would love being a grand dad I'd have laughed in their faces.

 

 

 

We should have skipped the kids and had grandkids first.

Happy BD, Cliff

Grandkids are great, grandchildren are great, grand young adults can be a real pain in the @#$%

 

 

 

Those are great looking trivets, like the cool fish design and pretty wood colors. Congrats to the grand kids and most to you for spending quality time with them and teaching them how great woodworking is. Belated happy birthday as well.

thanks guys

Topic moved from archives, a great story by @Cliff!

On 1/3/2014 at 4:20 PM, Ron Dudelston said:

We should have skipped the kids and had grandkids first.

What? Wait! Can you do that?

25 minutes ago, John Morris said:

What? Wait! Can you do that?

Guess ya could. Miss a lot of fun, though.

got a little misty  lookin at this thread.