Brazos Valley Woodturners Monthly Newsletter

Presidential Notes:

The Brazos Valley Woodturners had a great time in October at our third annual Retreat. I didn’t get an exact count but there were about 15 BVW members plus 5 Gulf Coast members. I want to particularly thank those of you who taught classes and did demonstrations. Joel taught a class in jewelry-making, Tom Dean taught pen-making and Bill Meador worked with the new turners.

Retreat demonstrations were done by James Norton (platters with multi-axis bottoms) and by two GCWA members, Bill Berry (sharpening tools) and Fog Tanner (end grain hollowing). Fog also taught a class in turning bowls the Richard Raffin way.

I also want to thank all of you who brought lathes for us to use. If you were not able to make the Retreat, you missed a great day of turning and learning.

Our November meeting will feature guest demonstrator, Brian Evans, from the Dallas club. Brian will demonstrate turning Christmas ornaments. This is particularly timely since we will be having our ornament exchange at the December meeting.

Several of our members attended the Appletree Show at the Heart of Texas Coliseum Nov. 6 and 7. There were nine of us altogether—Joel Crabbe, Bill Meador, Ken Mays, Ken Taylor, Wes Taylor, Johnny Farmer, James Norton, Charlie Lewandowski, and myself. We had two lathes and everyone took a turn at demonstrating. We made tops for the children who came by and that included some “young at heart” kids, too. Two teen-aged boys were so enthusiastic about wood turning that several members spent quite a bit of each day working with the boys. I want to thank Tom and Jan Dean for getting the banner printed for us and Johnny Farmer for designing and printing the brochures. We handed out a lot of them to interested passers-by.

We’ve had a streak of great weather so I hope you have gotten out to your shops to do some turning. See you Saturday!

Janice