Over the year-end holiday I took a break from work, but wanted to try something new so I grabbed my chainsaw, angle-grinder and a chunk of cherry from the pile and started on my first attempt at sculpture. I was like I was a kid again… I had a blast.
A special thanks to my friend and mentor, Tim O’Neill, for some much needed coaching and a couple of the loaner grinder attachments to get me started.
I started by drawing a circle in the center and then my making angle cuts with the chainsaw until I had the rough shape, and then using the planer wheel on the angle grinder to rough in the shape
Here’s a close up of he roughed-in shape, from here it was matter of a few different sanding attachments to the angle grinder and then lots of work with the random orbital sander. In case it wasn’t obvious from the pictures, this process generates a lot of sawdust and shavings.
I realized that if I wanted to let the color of the cherry sing, I would have to remove all the lighter sap-wood so it was back to the grinder for a bit more, before I started to turn the stem out of some scrap walnut I had laying around.
A few coats of our house finish to bring out the natural beauty of the cherry and bob’s your uncle… my first wooden pumpkin.
