These last couple of months have been so hectic I have had hardly any shop time what so ever.  I start to long for my shop the way you long for home when you are away for a long time.   Am I alone in this or is it something that happens to every woodworking hobbyist?   I found myself putsing in the shop the other day.  I knew I only had about 20 min so I didn’t want to start anything, I put away a couple of things and then started to plane the edge of a pine scrap board for no reason.  Just decided to make a bunch of shavings with my block plane.  If woodworking is my drug, then going into the shop and planing a board for no reason must be my methadone.  I am curious though; I wonder what others do to get their woodworking fix.  Other then TV and Internet stuff, I think we all do that one let me know.

I saw the plant stand I built for my wife's classroom, and it is a reminder that when you build a item for a specific spot it might not always be in that spot.  Originally, the plant stand was meant to go in-between the back of her desk and the window.  The plant stand was one of my earlier projects, and like many of you I’m sure you pick apart every mistake made on a piece.   What I told my self at the time was don't worry about it no one would ever see it.  The stand will be behind the desk.  Well the wife likes it somewhere else, and that’s ok it's her stand.  Now the plant stand doesn’t have any plants on it, and is prominently displayed in the classroom.  I just have to remember things change.  Just because I built something for a specific place or purpose, doesn’t mean that years down the road it will be doing either of those things.  I need to keep my standards up because some day, the front may be the back.   And if I want to build things that last, I need to build things that change too.

Like so many of us in this struggling to recover economy.  It was difficult to do a lot of holiday shopping this past Christmas season.  The money just wasn’t there.  So what I wound up giving my wife was a lot of promises, promises I am finding difficult to keep.   There were three projects that my wife wanted me to do.  A bookcase for our basement / office area, she is a teacher and could use some more storage (it looks like a library threw up down here, don't tell her that I said that).   A corner kitchen hutch, that she saw while I was watching The New Yankee Workshop, and last but not least two closet organizers for the master bedroom.  We are now in June and I haven’t started working on any of them.   The financial situation is not any better then it was in December.   So what is a loving really good-looking husband to do?   Well I think I have a couple options.  Option 1 is to run away to a cabin in northern Canada where she will be unable to find me.  Option 2 Convince her that I never told her that I would make these projects for her.   Option 3 (the only one that doesn’t result in castration) Scale back the projects.   The corner hutch is a painted project that is made out of butch ply and poplar so that wouldn’t be too bad cost wise.   For the bookcase, I was going to make a solid wood case with glass frame and panel doors in the arts and craft theme.  I think I will be able to scale back on this project.  If I scrap the doors and make the carcass out of oak ply, I will be able to cut down the cost considerably.  And the project that will cost the most the closet organizer.  I could only do her closet, but I think it would be better to do them at the same time so that the wood will match.  This is the one that worries me, so I might have to let this one go.  Well two out of three is not too bad right?  I guess I could always reconsider option 1 and 2, oh wait castration that’s right never mind.