Things I have made, part 2: Wood rocks!

Or, more correctly in this context, wooden rocks rock.

So, Laughter's spoons below may be cool, but they take a LOT of work. These don't.

I got the idea to make wooden rocks from some pictures I saw on the internet - hardwood chunks, cut and sanded into faceted shapes suitable for stacking. So I made some. I had three kinds of wood to work with - apricot, from some trees in our side yard that didn't make it; cypress, from the front yard; and sycamore, from the back yard. After making faceted shapes and playing with them (I let the kids play with them too), I decided to round some off to look more like river rocks.

These are made from apricot and finished with polyurethane.



After I finished those and made the little basket thingy, I thought they would look better in a clear bowl. So see below:



These are sanded but not finished. The lighter colored pieces are cypress. They smell great, but the pitch in the center makes them impossible to polyurethane. I have done a few with wax, and that works well.

Here is another view of the same pile:

The advantages of making wooden rocks:

1) You only need a band saw and a disc sander. Or a belt sander.

2) You don't have to follow any pattern.

The disadvantage:

You may become preoccupied with wood and finding time to sand. At least I did. They were like crack. Or chocolate.