Getting ready for the Wonders of Wood Show

There are many actions to be completed by our group for the Wonders of Wood Show in September. Charles Mitchell and Charles Sapp met with Rich Brooks, director of the Art Center, to clarify some of the changes to be made this year. A major change will be that the tables must be set up on Friday morning instead of Thursday night. As always, the carpet must be covered if you will be doing any carving. To help advertise, we have the option of using post cards and/or e-mail. With the post card, we could mention that by returning the card, the holder would receive a free chance for the drawings. By doing this, we would have a built-in mailing list for next year's show. Russ Sears mentioned that it is helpful to post advertisements on the board at Dierberg's, Schnuck's, Shop 'n Save and the library.

ADVERTISEMENT!

Everyone has come to the conclusion that advertisement is where it's at. Well, I agree and as Advertising Chairman, I'll be needing ideas and help. Due to other commitments and family duties, I may be your Weakest Link. So, I must depend on anyone with ideas to get with me to coordinate the effort and then to help with the actual activity. We need to get our ads in the newspaper, stores, malls, restaurants and anywhere else you can hang up a flyer. I will be getting the flyers out for distribution ASAP, but family health problems have delayed their completion. Feel free to jump in there and lend a hand any time you see something that needs to be done. 

John Bouchillon

July Display Case - Don Wilson

Background: Don retired in 2001 from the auto parts business. He served as district manager for a parts manufacturer, a store owner, and a store manager during those 35 years. He also spent nine years as a meat cutter, and four years in the military as a procurement specialist buying meat and dairy products. He has been carving for about 17 years and has been teaching carving for the St. Charles Adult Education Program, Woodcraft, Rocklers, and at various seminars. He is presently carving at Silver Dollar City - Valley Road Woodcarvers Guild. He is also doing some commission carving for two shops in Arkansas.

Training: Don learned a lot from Cletis Sparks and Walter Schmierbach in his earlier years. Mostly self-taught the last few years, by practice, practice, practice. He also attended seminars and workshops around the Midwest.

Favorites: His specialties and preferences are chip and relief carving.

Show and Tell

Charlotte Cross carved a mule with a man on it. It is a revenuer from Harold Enlow's class at Silver Dollar City this Spring. She also completed a chip carved ornament.  Basswood center.

Walter Schmierbach brought in his collection of chip carved crosses and letter openers. Walt creates his own cross and letter opener designs with compass and other drafting tools. He is always working on something different and I think he got some great ones here. The cross in the center contained a carefully inlaid circle of walnut. Really nice work.

Dudley Jackson showed his latest Len Dillon Santa ornament which he painted with water colors. He is really getting ready for Christmas this year. I believe he had another Santa ornament last month.

Charlie Sapp carved St. Francis of Assisi out of basswood. 

Ward Garrison brought in a Kachina Doll carved from cottonwood. He said it was $125, and he bought it in Gallop, New Mexico. My picture didn't turn out. Sorry Ward.

The Rest of the News

Gerald Sears Santa Seminar is scheduled for July 19-21. We have our 10 minimum signed up. There is room for two more to provide a buffer for last minute drop-outs. The seminar will be held at the O'Fallon Art Center. The cost is $125 and the rough out is $45-50. There is no additional per person charge. Gerald Sears has advised us that the size of this roughout is such that a carving arm or other support is needed.  If you taking the seminar and don't have a carving arm or vice, contact someone to borrow one or make one for yourself. We will have to be careful of the plastic tables at the art center. They are like the tables at the St. Peters Art Center and could be broken if the clamp on the carving arm is too tight. We need to make arrangements to have a backing board available to prevent damage to the tables. 

Charlie Sapp received a response from the Festival of the Little Hills officials. They assigned our club to a spot near Gate 1, the South most entrance to the Riverfront Park area, on the main route. This is not what our group wanted, but better than the dead end location we had last year.  Due to the late date, the Festival is August 16-18, the consensus was to accept this location. Ward Garrison agreed to coordinate the schedule to staff our booth.  Don Wilson will collect items for display again this year. If everyone will bring one or two carvings, we will have a striking display for the public.  Your pieces will be carefully protected and returned to you at the September 4th meeting.

Application forms for the Belleville Wood Show were sent to Charlie Sapp. It can be a handy place to sell our own woodcarvings and give us a place to sit and store your purchases while you are looking for more to buy. A motion was made to buy a table. We need someone to make a schedule to coordinate hours for manning the table.

Bob Craven will take over the duties of Sergeant-at-Arms, replacing Jerry Burson. Be sure to have your name badge on when you see Bob.

Carving supplies for Sale: Doug and Rainy Woollard will be setting up a table or two of 'stuff for sale' at the meeting on July 17th. They will be at the art center around 6 P.M. to set up. They are selling things like wood, blanks, rough-outs, tools, and lots of other miscellaneous carving items, 25 boxes and still counting as of this writing. Everything will be priced and they would really appreciate any help you can offer carting boxes and fixing tables.

Charlene McMenamy brought a VCR tape to us from Sue Vanderbilt, the woman who gave a talk on her friend, the Master Italian Woodcarver. I am looking forward to viewing the tape. We will try to have it as a program at a future meeting.  It is in the library if you would like to check it out and view it at home.  His work is truly something to behold.

Our Spring Carve Ot was June 22nd at the Ft. Zumwalt Park pavilion. The day was very nice. A little warm, but not bad in the shade. There was a nice breeze most of the time. The food was great as always. But, take a look (above) and tell me what is missing. U is missing. We had 3 of our regular carve out crew there, Red and Charlotte Cross and myself. Fortunately, Wilbert Brewton and Lew DeDaRosa joined the group this time. Wilbert brought a friend and my Wife joined in, as well as Red and Charlotte's number one son and his family, so we had a total of 12 for our afternoon meal. As usual, the ones that attended the event enjoyed the day. However, this is far too few to make this a worth while effort. In addition, we don't meet the park requirement for minimum number to reserve the pavilion. So, I will cancel the reservation for the Fall Carve out. If any one has any other ideas or would like to take charge of this activity, feel free to do so.

From the Wagon Master: The spring woodcarvers campout has come and gone and it was a good one again. The weather was great and we filled 11 campsites. Most people started arriving late Thursday night and Friday morning. This year, since I got off Thursday and Friday, I was able to get everyone that was there started on the project Friday. That made it a little easier on me for Saturday's carving. The people who came in just for Saturday were able to catch up, so most everyone got the project just about completed.

This year we got to use the Rec-room for our pot luck dinner. The room was nice and large and had AC, so it made supper even better. After supper, we took a poll to see what everyone thought of the new campground and everyone seemed to be happy.

Our next campout will be October 3-5 at the same place. Barb Smith is going to try and show us how to use a woodburner. She has some great projects lined up, but she will need to know how many people will be doing the project so she can have enough cut out. I know some of the people don't want to do woodburning. So, if you don't want to try it, we would still like to see you at the campout. Just do your own thing.

Saturday, we had a lot of people drop in to carve with us and tell some tall tales. It was great to see everyone. It seems this campground is a little closer to everyone so it makes for a nice ride to come see us and share in the pot luck dinner and then go home. 

We hope to see you this Fall. The campouts for 2003 will be June 5-7 and October 9-11. If you have any questions, feel free to call me at (314) 843-6244……………………..…. Bob Biermann

Jim Leifeld brought in his power tools and dust collector for a demonstration of duck and feather carving at the June19th meeting. If you missed this meeting, you missed a lot. Power carving is different from knife carving and is very interesting.  Jim knows the tricks of the trade, so to speak, and is always ready to help, advise and demonstrate.

Anyone interested in bird carving should talk to Jim and possibly attend one of the Duck Club meetings. They meet on Sunday afternoon, once a month at the Woodcraft Store on Olive. Check with Jim for additional details on time and location.  They have a hands on session and you will learn a lot.