I’ve been working on many turned pieces in Weeping Cherry, mostly bowls, but some candle holders for 3″ pillar candles. Here are a good selection of photos taken by Kelly Heck Photography, showing off the Weeping Cherry.

Here’s a quick look at a medium maple bowl, freshly roughed out on the new lathe. I roughed it out green – it had some moisture in it, but it was not very wet. The bark peeled off fairly easy … some of it flew off during turning. The result is a very pretty natural edge bowl. I wanted to show this to give you an idea of one of the challenges in turning natural edge bowls. Look at the crispness of the edge of the bowl as it spins. The edge is very sharp - when the speed is turned up to 800 - 1,200 RPM, those shard edges can you you quickly. So the warning on turning these bowls is to always be aware of where your body is in proximity to the spinning edge of that bowl.

Here’s a little experiment with a piece of maple this evening. The lighting isn’t great, but I wanted to get a couple quick photos. This Norway maple has nice color.

SHOP TIME!!!! I knocked out a good number of pieces yesterday, including these pictured. Rough-turned bowls in-progress… they will have to dry for about 3 months before I finish them. The first image is a bowl I've wrapped in paper for drying. I write the date and type of wood on each wrapped bowl so I can identify the wood without unwrapping the piece.

I took a break this afternoon to do a little wood-turning. So, yes, I’m posting a few more photos of wood – what can I say, I’ve been busy and having fun! The first image was taken inside – the other 4 were taken outside. These pieces are green (wet) and have no oil or other finish on them yet. Note that these are all from the same tree trunk!

I’ve cut out about 50 bowl blanks so far. There are likely more than 50 left … then I have to return to Herdon with the empty trailer to cut up and haul back another 7′ section, 3.5 feet in diameter, plus a few other smaller pieces. No time for boredom.