More woods and such

Ned and I are official with our business. Working on website and logo now. Shipping concerns the next issue at hand. Here is what I accomplished today, and yesterday. Really need to start selling stuff...


Red oak stump cut. Dad has the match. I cut this one a year later and after spray painting it for work.

 Cedar coffee table. HUGE and awesome.

 Cedar table of sorts. Unless I get a ridiculous offer I will sell it otherwise it is mine. 

 This is the end cut of an ash canker. Simply amazing.

Stay Tuned

Zombies and Wood Stuff

Well, to my credit I was able to pull off the Golden Birthday thing for Rachel, as we got a crowd of friends (15) and headed to Zombie Burger in Des Moines. To my un-credit, I not only brought my camera, but completed neglected to take pictures. I played with it in my pocket all night. FAIL. It was a splendid evening watching Walking Dead on AMC in a zombie bar while everyone around us drank spiked milk shakes.

Out of complete astonishment, Jason Rich, a senior in high school when I was a freshmen, was there and stopped to say hello. Haven't seen him since high school.

There thing is simple; burgers. I had Planet Terror, which was carmelized onions, BBQ sauce, cheddar, ranch dressing, and two greasy beef patties. Rachel had The Dead Moines; a beef patty, prosciutto, ham, and gouda.  I am still recuperating and did not again until dinner tonight and we had soup. We had fun, but I regret horribly forgetting pics.

Rachel and I as we walked back into our apartment after our evening out:

To back track a little, we made waffles and bacon for breakfast, and just vegged for the afternoon for her birthday. We watched The Little Mermaid, and tried the bottle cutter thingy again, to no avail. It was an enjoyable day in my opinion.


On a separate note I have taken every spare moment to work on wood stuffs. I completed my Damascus knife project, and am working on the sheath before I put it on the market:

 Flame grain walnut with osage orange caps.

I finished two antler mounts,

 and I finished another table of which I forgot to take pictures...Theme anyone?



Stay Tuned

Table/Business Update and Ice Fishing

 I have continued to plow away at tables lately. I completed my black cherry table set which includes the two end tables as well as the coffee table. They turned out better than I could have expected.

Ned and I have come up with a name and have decided upon Rustick Woodshop. We are working on logo and design right now but we love what we do and want to make money doing it. With that in mind we are maintaining hobby/small scale sale as of now. Excited to say the least.

Now, on to today. Before the snow came in Nick, Jon Jones, and I went to the East Peterson Pits outside of Ames to try our luck at ice fishing. Do-able yes, creepier than hell, even more-so yes. 4-6 inches of good solid ice. We caught a few small bluegill, one small bass, and a couple crappies. The kicker was when we started hearing Jones freak out about losing a fish behind us for about an hour. When he freaked out the final time it was because he caught the fish he was after. I have never witnessed it before, but he pulled up a small catfish. We decided to join him in his success and try our hands at the same fate. He pulled up another, better cat. Unbelievable.

We fished there for another hour or so and he continued to lose fish at the hole. I had finally hooked up with a good size cat and again, lost it at the hole. Awesome experience, but still could not believe that catfish could be caught through the ice.



Stay Tuned

Progress...Sorta

Update:

Rachel continues the seemingly never-ending vet school as I seek meaningful, gainful employment. I recently took a part time job at HyVee Wine and Spirits here in Ames. I also had a phone interview for a full time position with the INHF. I had an internship with them in 2009, and this is honestly a dream come true kind of situation. BUT with that said I am not counting my chickens. It is a competitive world and I need to keep looking for full time employment.

My friend Ned Parker and I are moving forward with the wood working business. It will remain a part time/ hobby but we are filing the necessary tax documents so we can name the business and begin active advertising. We will continue to work small scale, but are obviously willing to work on expansion.

With that, I have found a semi-limitless supply of kiln-dried, milled lumber. I have begun working on laminate works. My recent supply was black cherry. I built a matched set of end-tables and a matching coffee table. Legs in the works still.

 The coffee table stained:

At this point, I don't prefer this type of table but the materials were free.



Stay Tuned

Brushy Creek Ice Fishing

Yesterday Nick, Jon Jones, and I spent the whole day on the ice. Weather report said high of 42 degrees with 18 mph winds from the SSE. Warm and windy but comfortable... We left Boone a little before before 7:00am and headed for hard water. The North boat ramp we parked at was already buzzing with people doing the same thing, and we were the early ones...We walked somewhere around 600 yards from the boat ramp. It remained in site of our camp. Arrival to our site was a little before 8:00am. We started by drilling some holes and checking for fish. 14-16 inches of good hard, but sheer ice in places. Nick was the first to find a fish, and a crappie was the prize. A few more, and a walleye later, Jones and I decided to work our way out from Nick.

 It took a solid two hours before I finally found a fish. Nick at that point had several fish riddled about him. This unfortunately had attracted local attention. Some bearded guy pulled up to us and started badgering us about our success before he noticed Nick's pile. Once he saw the walleye it was game on. He left on his four-wheeler and returned with a shack and about five other people. Jones advised that we put all fish in a pail from here on out. After word spread that Nick had a hot hole we found our 'company' was closing the gaps amongst us. Nick and I talked to another guy whom was having difficulties finding fish, but it was proof that word spreads fast.

 We actually continued to catch fish, even with people around us.

I started to accumulated a pile myself, which found their way into a hollow tree bole in the ice. Being there early, we never thought hard enough about being prepared. It was cloudy, cold, and windy. The wind was killing us. We had some liquids, and a box of swiss cake rolls, but by noon we were starving. Jon had some friends join us on the ice about noon, and they were ill-prepared and very poorly dressed for the occasion. At about 1:30 they decided to make a food run and were even willing to pick some up for us. Two McDoubles and a large fry when freezing cold is life changing.

Fishing with Jon Jones was comical. He went from hole to hole moving constantly, but he caught fish. Nick and I fished out of the same two holes for the majority of our day. We enjoyed the conversation and the company, and it drove Jones crazy. He eventually made his way over to our area to fish.

Nick again, produced and caught another walleye. It about threw Jones into fits.

 

I came prepared for 42 degrees and a little windy. Out of habit I grabbed and extra coat and a hat. I would be frozen to the ice without it. If it looks cold that is because it was.

Despite the cold it was a blast!

It was decided between Nick and I that we would risk the backlash from the Mrs' and fish until dark before heading home. It was an interesting spectacle to say the least, watching the lake before sundown. We had watched countless cars, trucks, etc drive out onto the ice, and hundreds of people within eyesight. Right about 5:00 they started filtering out. We waited as the evening bite is usually the hottest. We caught one fish collectively after 5:30pm. The bite was over and everyone else knew it. We collected camp and took a few pics of our haul before leaving.

We were freezing but happy. A few phone calls to the ladies and we were on our way back. I helped Nick clean most of the fish before I headed home myself. Lisa relieved me of my duties as she understood that like herself, Rachel spent the day alone in the apartment. Not only was Rachel not unhappy with me she was still working on a blanket project, and a vat of chili was on the stove. Greatest. Wife. Ever. We enjoyed sitting on the couch watching The Holiday, or more like Rachel watched the movie while I passed out next to her. Hehe...

She has continued to work on the blanket, for a silent auction for vet school, and sit by the fire clipping ends...

Hopefully I can do a better job of keeping things updated in the future.


Stay Tuned

Fun with Friends

Busy.

Been shed hunting a lot and to the point in which I am burned out. Rachel remains inundated with vet-school bullshi-...well you know... Finished at the Parking Division today and continuing the quest for employment. In the time being here are a few things done since last updated:

Went to Jordan Creek Mall with Rachel and some of our friends a few weeks back. Pretzels, books, unbearable wafts of cheap cologne, and a movie. It was honestly enjoyable. We finished our evening at Joe's Crab Shack. Having never been there we were in it for the goods. Our friends Nate and Emily Lakner were with us. Rachel and Nate are not overly fond of seafood (even so Rachel order coconut shrimp!) but Em and I are minor junkies. We decided to order a steam-pot to share while Nate and Em got their own thing. We got something with some form of variety. Crab, lobster, shrimp. No oysters or clams. 

Couldn't get away from the show of the whole thing...

 Giant purple goo with shark shot....

wow.

It was actually nice to spend some time out with Rachel and I was pleasantly surprised that she not only ate some form of seafood, but enjoyed it.

More recently I have spent my spare time shed hunting but with 20+ hours walked I haven't even come up with a dead head. I have enjoyed the peaceful woods, but finding an actual antler would be welcome. At any rate, when back at the farm last weekend Michael Parker and I walked hard all day with no bone to show for it but came back to the ranch to something spectacular.

A swirling mob of mallards were filtering in and out of the corn field behind Micheal's house. I have seen this to some degree but they were close and I bet there was well over a thousand of them. They spanned across a handful of fields. 
I have seen It done before and thought I would give it a try with my camera. I used Micheal's binoculars to get super zoom

We were watching the birds filter through the corn field, coming closer and closer when Michael looked up and spotted a bald eagle. What more could we ask for. A soon as the majority of the flock caught site of it, they all got up at once. The eagle swooped in and out of the swirling mallards before landing in the tree behind his house.

I never got pictures of the two together but second after this pic was taken a second eagle showed up. They left as soon as the mallard flock moved on to another field. It was amazing. I will take this kind of thing over finding a shed any day.

Tomorrow means ice fishing...


stay tuned