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I finally completed this project. I took me the longest of any project I have tried in my years of scrolling. Took two tries. I wanted to make a picture of a modern diesel train engine for my nephew-in-law that is a conductor. I could not find a pattern of one. Talking to @munzieb one time I mentioned it to him, he told to send him a picture of what you want and he would make a pattern. And he did, a real detailed pattern. A beautiful pattern.. I worked on it, gave up once, then decided to try again. I worked on this over a period of 4 or 5 months. Bernd Would call every once in a while to see how I was doing. I told him I was about to give up. I just could not scroll like I use to. He said he would give it a try. Two weeks latter he sends me his completed scrolled picture of it! So the challenge was thrown down. I had to quit whining and keep cutting. Finally got there. Many, many thanks to Bernd for the coaching and encouragement. Would never have finished it without it. I still have to frame it. The first picture is mine, the second is the one he cut and sent to me. His was even more difficult than mine, his was a little smaller.

Love making trucks. Wood used for these was Mahogany, Walnut, Maple and Ebony.

Wanted to make some small gift boxes and ordered some mahogony. 6 each 24 x 4" 1/8" boards (should have ordered 5-6" wide boards to better fit pattern). Stack cut 2 at a time. finish with gloss laquer. I had done the 2 center boxes with bubinga wood previously but it is getting very expensive. (twice as expensive as mahogony) Fun cutting.

My Sister aske for a special Christmas gift. She has a lot of Jewelry chains that always get knoted up in her regular jewelry box and asked if I could make her a case where she could hang her chains. I looked a several boxes on the web to get some ideas and came up with my own design (on the fly!) I would have like to use an exotic wood but it is getting very expensive so I went with 1/2" Poplar since it would be painted. Built the doors first since that would determine the final size of the box. Routered the recess for the front plaque first and then cut the miters. I used my Peacock pattern (Stack cut) 1/8" BBPW and used an 1/8" backer painted black and felt on the inside. Used picture frame hold downs to hold it all in place. Built the frame based on the dimensions of the combined doors. Added a 1/4" backer into the recess of the frame. Went 1/4" but should have gone a little wider. Not much room for the screws. 3M sprayed felt and applied to inside of backer. Bought hinges and hangers and french cleat from Woodcraft. Got very thin magnets from HD. Finish was several coats of black lacquer. Gold paint was from Hobby Lobby for the peacocks. I'll be sending it off this week and hope it get there before Christmas.

Haven't posted for a while. Here are a couple of my latest. Eagle Reflection pattern by Steve Collins and Young Love pattern by Charles Dearing. Jeff

I was commissioned to make this plaque for a client who works for American Airlines. He plans to give it to a long time colleague who is retiring after the first of the year. I combined fretwork and intarsia. The lettering was so delicate that I decided to fill it with black wood filler. I used blue pine for the background and frame.

This project was cut on a 16" x 10" x 5/8" piece of salvaged American Chestnut using patterns by Jacob Fowler and Sue Walters for the scrollsawing which I then modified during the carving process. It was stained with artist oil paints and finished with Minwax Polycrylic finish. The Chestnut seen in the background was not stained and this is the natural color of the wood. It was easy to see why Chestnut was so popular among the early American furniture craftsmen because of its workability and finishing qualities. Dick

This was a request from my cardiologist this past year. Little did I know that he travels to an Indian reservation and treats heart patients. So after seeing what I do with the maple burl slabs, he requested one of a "Young Indian Boy Dancing". Since the doctor is of East India decent, I asked him, "Indian from India or Native American Indian?" Native American he said, so from a photograph of a young Indian dancing at a local powwow, here is the finished project. This was done on my 21" Seyco and the wood was one and a quarter inch thick. This was my most favorite piece I did in 2023. Jane Hiatt

A jewelry box for my only granddaughter. This project called for woodworking techniques I have never done before. From the hand cut blind dove tails to controlling chip-out on the curly maple - it has challenged (and frustrated) me beyond measure. The drawers are divided and flocked in black. The bottom drawer has a ring storage area. It is FINALLY done and I will be giving it to her at her birthday party today. It has a hidden drawer that is accessed by a sliding panel on the back. I am ready to get back to scrolling now.

Well, it's probably been two years since I posted anything I made. This is a pattern from Scroll Saw Woodworking and Crafts, Fall 2008. Since day the day I received the magazine I said I was going to try this pattern. Let's see, that's 2023 minus 2008, subtract, carry the 1, about 15 years ago. Dick Miraglia was featured in that issue and did a fine job explaining the steps. I was a little hesitant about some of the steps but decided I could always use the firewood if it doesn't work out. Grabbed a maple slab, cut to size, used a trim router to lower the perimeter, then the fun started. The scrolling was straightforward but the maple made is slower than I'm use to. The trickiest part was carving/shaping the face. Not too bad, but I'd tackle it a bit different next time. The detailing was fast and fun. A big shout to @dickmira for the great article. I'll be doing some others as soon as I create some patterns. Cheer everyone!

I'm going to cheat a little on this reply This was not done last year but rather 38+ years ago after I started this great hobby I may be off topic a bit, so I apologize for that When I came out of rehab(drugs and alcohol, the good old days) I needed something to keep me busy Long story short, I found a scrollsaw which I knew nothing about and bought it when I saw that the pattern book had Christmas ornaments. I'll make some ornaments, have my son and daughter paint them. Then I saw this little guy and just had to try and cut him out of wood. He's precious to me and it was a great moment when I finished him. (see the pun there....LOL) So, he's sitting there as I was one day, wondering if I made the right decision with rehab and this life changing time for me, my wife, my kids, my job, friends... Well, I can honestly say that this little guy and I both agree that it was and has been the best decision I ever made in my life. 38 +years sober and drug free and it hasn't been all that bad. Still married to a wonderful girl who could have easily walked away but she never did.

I have been on a crunch with my biggest show coming up next week. This is a set of patterns by Sheila Landry. The Sleigh is made from 1/4” Maple and 3/8” Sapele for the runners. The reindeer are made from 1/2” and 1/4” Cherry. For size reference, the board they are on is 4’ long. I’m pricing the set at $250!

I finished this Jim Blume pattern this afternoon and the wife dubbed it as being one of my best pieces. I'm not so sure about that but I will say it is an outstanding pattern and a lot of fun to cut. I tried to find my directions to count the number of cuts using Inkscape but never could locate them among my "never lose anything" filing system I have set up on my computer. This was cut using the Blonde wood I had located at Lowe's with a Birch backer. The piece is stained with Ipswich and the backer is stained with Ebony. Four coats of Polyacrylic and pre-fab framing material provided the finish. I do spline my frames. Despite the many holes, the piece is quite easy to cut. There is only one delicate area, that being the lower part of the eagle's neck... the part just under his beak. I encourage you to give it a try.

This is Jim Blume's "Heading West" pattern that was designed to be 11X14. I decided to make it a little more challenging by cutting it into an 8X10. Baltic Birch stained Ipswich with a black backer and a Pine frame. Both cutting and frame were sprayed with several coats of Polyacrylic with light sanding between coats. This was a lot of fun to cut and surprisingly the reduced size didn't make it very difficult. Thanks, Jim, for another great pattern.

Today I finished a pattern of this little angel that I thought was too cute to not cut. This is the second project I cut this month and it looks like I just might be finally spending some time in my shop other than Christmas presents. I hope you like this as much as I did when I saw the pattern. This is also the first oval frame I have ever attempted. A little bit of a struggle but best of all a good learning experience Dick heppnerguy

Woods used Maple, Ash, Ebony and Wenge.

'Nuff said!

You may or may not recall a couple of weeks ago I posted a paper cut pattern of a little house tucked in among a lot of foliage. Well I received a lot of nice comments. I found still another paper cut pattern that was a little more challenging than the first one and showed it to my wife who immediately wanted me to cut that one with a matching backer board color. So I printed the pattern and set out to cut it for her. She was pleased with it and we hung it yesterday beside the first paper cut pattern containing the little house. I again cut the entire pattern with a #1 spiral blade and after a few hours had it finished. I used a 1/4 inch thick solid core Baltic Birch covering, of which I do not like the wood I used but it came out alright from the front side. Now my wife is happy having the new item on the wall and I was thrilled to find a project that challenged me to cut. Dick heppnerguy

My brother gave me this piece awhile back. I’ve seen this drawing of a cross before. Cindy did the pattern drawing it on the wood for me. Pretty piece of cherry. Semi gloss poly for the finish. The walnut piece, we did the same thing. I’ve had that walnut since about 1992. It came from some rotting worm eaten trees on my sisters property. If you give that wood long enough it will tell you what it wants. Thanks for looking.

How about a little flower power.

My dad was a Baptist minister. 50ish years ago he brought a discarded upright piano home from the country church he was pastoring and refurbished it. It stayed in my mom and dad's home till they passed away. Then my sister had it for awhile, but it's been stored in a garage for years now. My sister saw something similar to these somewhere and asked me if i could make her one of the key holders. I made her and her daughter the key holders and my son and daughter-in-law the one that says, "Love is the key." All the materials except for the text and the hangers came from the old piano. The little brass buttons are part of the key/hammer mechanism of the piano, called capstans. Felt like my dad was smiling while I worked on them. The chips on the keys were done by my mischievous son and nephew with a toy hammer. Maw Maw wasn't happy.

I made wood-art pieces for a California friend of his beach house and the coast at Dillon's Beach.

Just finished this one I made for a craft fair I have coming up this Easter Weekend. It's made from 4mm Birch ply and finished with 2 coats of sanding sealer and 2 coats of acrylic lacquer. Hope you like it. Keith

I tweaked a great pattern by Sam Custodio. I absolutely love good finger style guitar picking and have tried many times to attain the skill but it's just not in the cards for me. I listened to acoustic guitar music through my headphones while cutting this and it was so therapeutic. The wood is 1/2" Sycamore and the backer was a thin plywood bottom from a repurposed dresser drawer. "♫ Who draws the crowd and plays so loud? Baby it's the guitar man. ♫

I really enjoy Russ Beard's pattern but have never cut one. I saw this one recently and had to give it a go. I am happy with the results and have plans to cut another of his projects soon. It is on 1/4 BB Ply. I made a quick frame as my shop time has been very short lately and wanted to get things finished that I had started. So this is the results. The photo, as usual did not turn out very well as this is not one of my better things I do. Often a lot of my photo are of the floor instead of the subject I am trying to take. Dick heppnerguy

I haven't posted in some time with new projects because I've been busy working on commissions. I thought I'd post some of them to give you a "look-see." The Porsche was actually three photos I combined into the one piece. The K-9 was with a local police department and passed away. The plaque was a presentation to the handler. The three dogs together are my fur babies (not counting the new puppy I got the wife for Christmas) I'll post patterns of the Border Collie and Lab in the library. Those were 'free to use' photographs that I made patterns from at the request of the customer. If you have any questions about any of the pieces, please let me know. Hope you enjoy!

My first multi-wood intarsia piece is done. Finished with 4 coats of shellac. Frame is scrap wood, oak??? Finished with one coat of black Osmo.

While the right side of the picture recalls spring and summer, the left side depicts autumn and the coming winter. Plans and drawing belongs to me.

Making a lamp for a contest at our wood turning club. The lamp was made on the lathe but the shade was made with the scroll saw.

"Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence."

I made and of the Submarine Service plaques at the request of my neighbor to give to a good friend that was a submariner. The last one of these will make more of just the emblems for giveaways.

When I was an exhibitor at our county fair this year a man came up to me and pointed to a compound cut angel I had on display. It wasn’t for sale (I made it for my wife a few years before she passed away and wasn’t going to part with it) but just there to demonstrate what you can do with a scrollsaw. He asked me if I would make 12 of them for him. I was a little hesitant (I’m not much of a mass production type - rather do one offs) until he told me the backstory. His wife, who died around the same time as mine, would give the grandkids an angel every year for Christmas. When she died he decided to keep the tradition going. When he saw my angel he thought they would be perfect for this year, so I agreed to make them … all 12 of them! He was pleased and so was I. The bodies are walnut and the wings soft maple.

I ran across this pattern, which by the way was not a scroll saw pattern, and liked it so much I printed it so my wife could look at it later that day. Immediately she said that she really liked it and wanted me to cut it. I told her that it was not a scroll saw pattern and it was not a really clear photo of it anyway. Well my wife usually gets her way, so I told her I would try to look it up again and see if I could get a clearer look at it, but I could not find it again, so I enlarged it and gave it a go. I was going to make a frame for it and make a rectangular background but she did not want one like that. So I made an extended background and painted it with three different colors, as I did. So this is how it came out. Reminds me of something from a kids story book about witches or something like that. Dick heppnerguy

Heceta head lighthouse intarsia.

This was a special order from a man whose father and step-mother claimed the zebra as their spirit animal of sorts. Both of these people died and the man that ordered it wants to memorialize his dad and step-mom.

All done!

A woman in town asked me if I could/would try to finish up a project her husband started but passed away to cancer before he could finish it. I finally got it finished this evening. Here are the before and after pic. I did not make the wheel just finish it of best I could. Paint it and cut out the boat parts to put on it. I cut pieces and filled in the open spots on the back to make look better. And thanks to grampa Paul for doing the boat pattern for me greatly appreciated. Todd

Well, it's been some time since I've posted here, so I apologize if this is a bit long. After seeing the awesome work some have done with epoxy fill on their work I gave it a try, several times (lol) and each time, in my opinion was an epic fail. I just couldn't get the epoxy to be bubble free. I really wanted it to look like stained glass. So then the little voice in my head went " just use actual stained glass". I really shouldn't listen to that voice, but I tried. I've learned that I suck at cutting glass, result..epic fail #2. Then while at work and pondering my dilemma about how cool the stained glass stuff is and how talented those folks who can create those awesome looking pieces and I really wanted to do something like that except with wood on my scrollsaw! So after many attempts I came up with this. As this is only a test I used basswood to keep cost down and colored acrylic, which I cut on my scrollsaw (win-win) ! The acrylic is in the middle so it looks the same from both sides. For me this is a success, so on to different woods and more complex patterns, I'm thinking that Intarsia patterns might be a good fit for this. Now to dig thru all my Intarsia patterns. Chris

Well I came down with the Flu, so what do you do? I decide after sitting and sleeping in the recliner to go out and paste a pattern for a bowl on a piece of wood. I guess it didn't stop there as you can see. Made out of 1 1/4 birch countertop plained down to 7/8 then cut and put together.

When I was at my daughter's place, I noticed that their stockings were just being hung on a picture hook. Mom to the rescue!!! This is a Kathy Wise design that showed up in my FB feed recently. I cut this as segmentation from one piece of reclaimed elm, from our city's canopy. It is a little more than 1" thick. Used a(many) #7 Precision skip blade(s). Colour provided by watered down Unicorn Spit. There is one major cutting error that I turned into a design choice. This is just waiting for the Osmo satin finish to dry.

This is my attempt at Frank’s Kokopelli Band. Still in my early stages of scrolling and this is the most challenging project I have tried. Made out of 1 inch recycled Rimu that a scavenged from a demolition site. The wood is very dry and quite brittle in the thinner places but oh well it is all part of the fun. So here it is with a big thank you to Frank.

I just finished cutting this monstrous Haunted House for Halloween. Hundreds of cuts. Pattern by me. This is backlit for "spooky" effect. I cut this mostly with Pegas #3 spiral blades.

Cut with spiral blades from a beautiful piece of mahogany that is 12" x 10 1/2" x 1 1/2" thick. Dick

I cut a fret work box a few years ago that I really liked. It was made out of Bubinga wood and had a great looking redish color. I have used up most of my Bubinga and come to find out it has become very hard to get. I had some 1/4" Mahongany left over from another project and decided to give a try. The pieces I had were not as wide as the original project, so I had to go a little smaller. Lots of repetitive cuts and I liked adding the funiture style feet. I dadoed the edges 1/8" on all side but the top for a stronger fit and glued in place with CA glue including the bottom. I recessed the hinges 1/8" on the base and flush on the top and used my 2 sided tape technique for positioning the hinges. Waxed and pretaped the screws and then ground down the screws for the top so they would not pass through the the 1/4" material. Finish is Shellac and Gloss lacquer.

A client commissioned me to make a jewerly box for his wife for their anniversary. He gave me a picture of some hibiscus he wanted inlayed into the top which I made a pattern for. He also wanted the message put under the lid. I got it done way ahead of schedule but this time of year I start getting super busy with shows.

Been awhile since I posted. This last project took approximately 6 weeks to complete. Pattern by Lewis A. Jewell. Size is 45” w, 36” h. This is the third one I’ve done.

Having fun cutting these birdhouses. Been using scrap material of what ever I have and cutoffs from the hardwood dealer. Have cut 50+ with at least the same waiting to be cut. I like the different colors in some Cedar pieces and the grain in the Cypress is nice. Even tried something different with the sock shaped one. Painting the birds different colors and cutting some from Purple Heart and other woods.

WWII F4U CORSAIR FIGHTER done in poplar and maple.