Wood Working Projects You Can Do At Home

By Owen Jones

More and more individuals are turning to making household items in their spare time as a hobby. Some people make rugs or throws, others make pots and others are turning to woodwork. Wood working is a very satisfying hobby or craft. It is also therapeutic after having done your day job and when you have finished, you have something useful which you can be proud of. You could even sell it. Both men and women are turning to wood working projects for relaxation.

The majority of these new weekend carpenters are not professional trades people and so they need help with a wood working project like a bench or a cabinet. This help comes most often in the guise of wood working plans. A good set of wood working plans will give a description of what to do first, an exploded diagram of the item to be made and all the necessary dimensions. These details will really help the wood working project to go smoothly.

The first thing to do, clearly, is decide what you want to make. If this is your first wood working project, do not be over bold. Do not leap right in there and choose an ornate display cabinet. The best objects to start with are a bench, a dog kennel or even a bird table. Once you have finished this task, you can move on to something more difficult with increased confidence.

So, having made up your mind on a wood working project, you should look for a set of plans for that article. You will find woodworking plans in DIY shops, hobbyists, craft shops and on the Internet. If you look online, look for a specialist in woodworking plans so that you know that they will be complete in every detail

The next task is to totally familiarize yourself with the plan and the project. You will need to come to a decision which timber you want to use and how many lengths of the different sizes you will require. This information could be given on the plan. You should order or buy in everything you need (except glass) right from the beginning. You will also require glues, nails, screws and tools. Check which tools you will want for the job and buy or borrow them. This information may be given on the wood working project's plans too.

When you have assembled your materials and your tools, you should make sure that the tools are in good condition. The saws and chisels must be sharp. Put a new blade in your craft knife and make sure your tape runs smoothly and that the end has not broken off. It is very annoying, once you get going, to have to stop and sort your tools out, just when you want to use one of them.

Finally you can begin. It is a fantastic feeling. Try to plan your time too. Neighbours are not going to want to hear your power saw going after dark, so try to get that sort of thing done in daylight hours, you can assemble the parts quite quietly later on in the evening. - 32367

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Art Pencil Drawings -- Adding Watercolor & Ink to Your Art

By Lori Lee

Art pencil drawings can be made even more fun by adding pen, ink and watercolor to them. This is an art form learned from Claudia Nice. Claudia is a Pacific Northwest artist who has her studio in Oregon. She has many animals on her place and when you attend a workshop with her, you get to see exactly how to draw the fur on a horse by looking at a real, live horse!

The first step to start your art pencil drawing is to choose something to draw. A subject or scene that's easy, such as a flower, is a good choice if you are new to drawing. You will first want to work up a pencil drawing sketch and you can use art pencils or a regular pencil to do this.

"But I can draw!" is a common thing to say right about now. Please keep reading because everyone can draw! You may want to start out easy by tracing a photo or picture from a book onto your piece of paper. It doesn't have to be anything fancy and certainly not perfect. You can look at a photo or picture and sketch it out while looking at it. And you can also create abstract art by drawing some shapes on a piece of paper -- anything that you feel like.

Supplies that are essential to this first drawing are:

A pencil, Ink pens -- the ink must be waterproof, smudge proof and archival ink, Watercolor paper -- 130 pound is good for this type of work, A picture or idea of what you will draw, Watercolor sticks, pencils or watercolor pencils

Once the pencils drawing is complete, the ink work is added next. This is simple to do by just tracing over the pencil lines you've just drawn with the ink pen. Adding depth and dimension using extra ink in areas to darken can be done by looking at your original photo or picture and adding shading where needed. If you're drawing an animal, you can add lines or strokes of ink to darken the fur around the eyes and ears.

Next, you will choose areas to add watercolor to. Use the watercolor pencils, sticks or paint with the brush and a little water. Be careful not to over saturate your paper by adding too much water as you don't want all the colors to run together -- or maybe you do! There's no such thing as bad art and you don't have to show your work to anyone if you don't want to! So have fun and experiment. - 32367

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