had a blank to mill down to four legs.   First step was to cut a few parts outThis is ok  for the crosscut part, but, if you think I will be grabbing some big old rip saw and sawing through this stuff,  ah nope.   Laid out a center line in each half.    Grabbed the Craftsman Circ. saw  and ripped right down the middle.    Was  a might tricky, with the vise holding things.   I sawed down to the vise, BEFORE things got pinched in by it.     Moved the blank so that the sawn part was in the vise.   Finished the cut, coming from the other direction.  Rough sawn boards, anyway, what's a few more saw marks?

Got out a special jack plane, to take down the rough spotsLooks like a shark, don't it?   This is that Corsair C-5, with the Schwarz cambered edge iron.    Hungry beast ( about like a shark) but it gets rid of the rough sawn stuff quickly.  rough blank, before the jacks got a-hold of it.    That red frogged one is the other jack plane.    It is set to take a nice thick shaving as well, though not as big as the Corsair does  one side ready for the smoothers.   The hardest part was getting all four sides square to each other, and at least close to the same size on each face.  I did get three done, before I had to take a break for awhile ( sweat was running down the lens of my glasses) and the fourth is in the vise.     Making a mess of the floor, thoughHoping the fourth blank doesn't run away before I get back down there.  

Steve, what was your process for getting all 4 sides square to each other?

Hold a square to a side, until it is straight across.  It becomes a base line for the others.   I work from one side to the next, until each are square to the last one.    I also tend to sight down along the planed side, looking for any dippity -dos and other "defects".    Just takes a bit. 

Fun part is coming up next.....Tapering two sides, with just hand planes....