above, february 16, about 3 months ago ...." if you dont like the weather in vermont, just wait a minute" is how the saying typically goes. now, if you wait three months from the photo above, youll really see some stuff happen ... so, here we are today on the EIGHTH day in a row of top down on the convertible weather, sunny skies and warmish temperatures. a week ago tuesday, it was news when, for the first time in 3 weeks, we had two days in a row with no measurable precipitation. now we havent had any in over a week ... go figure ... click the images for a taste of high springtime in vermont ...
last friday, i took a trip to burlington to order some custom steel parts in bristol, look at some slabs at lathrops and attend the opening of the bench show, which was really nice. like other water around the country, lake champlain is at an all time record high. beautiful though .
the asparagus started coming in for real last saturday .
and the azaleas are blooming ... rhododendrens next ...
saturday, 18 holes with bill laberge at lake st. catherine ... from the 14th tee above ... a long choice in (and down) to get home
sunday some tennis in the afternoon, and monday, i stayed home after work and fixed my garage roof where last winters ice had broken some roof slates.tuesday, back at the tennis courts with mr. cooper when sam and jim stopped by to show us their morels ...
long trail school courts (our local tennis club) in the backround below
wednesday afternoon, 9 more at the equinox in manchester; a beautiful course ....
and then thursday afternoon, a little fishing with sam in the mettowee down the street, after work ... hes into the fly tying thing and getting pretty good at it ...
pagoda dogwood about to bloom... you may not be familiar with it, but when it blooms its a very cool, understory, sculptural tree ...
a couple hendricksons were coming off ... just a nice choice to end the work day ...
nicely fished, but no luck
beautiful sunsets this week
the ducks are back and the birds are going crazy ....
i leave you with some tulips in kits garden ... rain a comin this weekend ...
we delivered the claro walnut sllab coffee table to connecticut yesterday. it was one of the slabs that we received back in february. one is slated to shortly become a gallery piece and two are still available. the clients found our website, and, coincidentally, they have a second home in the area and were able to stop by, select the slab the like, check out several base designs and finalize the details. it was one of those projects that went along quickly and smoothly from start to finish. i hope to get an onsite picture at some point as jim said it really completed the room. click the photos to enlarge them ...
this was our original photo shown on our blog ...
this is the side they selected and the details we decided on during their visit .. 
the cad drawing
after the second coat of gloss ...
sams welding jig that we made on the cnc ...
parts and pieces ... in the end, we used our blackening finish ..
all in, all done ... i had to take pictures of this one three different times before i finally got it right, but it was worth it ... this is a really wide piece of walnut and its kind of unlikely ill get one like it again. click the photos to enlarge them ...
you can see a little more of the base here ...
and in this shot, some of the natural defects (ant trails) that we left in the finished piece ...
and heres the photo from my supplier, good hope hardwoods, that i sent to the potential client to seal the deal.
and here is sams fabricating/welding jig that he used when building the trapezoidal shapes for the base verticals ... those he connected with 2.5" angle iron which gave us a rigid, independent base structure which we will remove for shipping ...
this table top had some miles on it before we finished, and it was no picnic to move it .. it started in california somewhere, went to pennsylvania, to dorset and the woodshed at my house, moved to the garage, from there to the shop for final smoothing and sanding, and then to the finish room on a special cart we built to get it out the door .. going down the 2 high 8 long ramp from the front steps of the shop was thrilling.
across the drivechoice was a piece of cake comparatively ... jim is actually on tiptoes here ...
and here you can see the cart and the more relaxing ramp into the finish room ...
where it went through its usual paces ... off to aspen this week, or maybe el paso first.
well, the verdict is in ... the slab i wrote about back in april is now a coffee table ... on its choice to aspen, colorado this week sometime ... it was 
4/29 ... on the wall ... waiting to be something ... +/- 50" x 108"
top view
seated view
first step in sam making the legs .. cap the open bottoms of the 3.5" pipe and tap it for adjustable levelers ... 
then he added the plates that attach them to the table top and painted them black. simple, direct, cost effective and they look great ..
desk concept with slab below before it was finished ...
table concept ... this client switched to and elm slab .... which was also nice ..
the finished elm slab ... arrived in chicago yesterday ...
more slabs, ready to go ... get em while theyre hot ...
the photo above is from a post about a claro walnut slab table last summer. it shows me and my trustly (25 years), puny 3.5" makita power planer that we use as a first step to quickly remove the rough stuff and flatten it out ... just like a hand plane only louder and less tiring ...
the next step after the power planing is to scrape achoice the tracks . in the video clip here, you can see the progress will and trevor make on removing the power plane tracks in the 21 seconds of the clip. its why we dont much believe in belt sanders for table tops and panels. they probably spent about 5 minutes total, including short breaks, to completely prepare the slab for final sanding with our porter cable 505 sander. typically after scraping we start with 150 and finish with 180 ... i have written briefly about the two handled scraper in the past and i still think it is one of the 
you probably already have one of these gathering dust somewhere ... learn how to tune it up and get it working. youll be glad you did ... 
in this photo, trevor lays out cuts that could straighten the slab somewhat to show a potential client its mellower shape .. inside the tape it measures +/- 48 x 102.
first coat of finish yesterday .. open studio is coming, and for that, the slab will be hung on the wall using temporary french cleats as on the bed we finished recently ... as i mentioned in this previous post, it is hard for a client to visualize the finished look of a slab in the rough ... more photos later next week ...
