An exploration in life.

Tiny Shop Woodworks. How did I come up with that? Well, it’s because it is a tiny shop. It’s just me in a one car garage with a bunch of woodworking equipment and tools. It’s a little bigger than when I first started but it’s still small.  

I did not start my life as a woodworker. I built one or two things in a ninth-grade shop class but then went on to work in the travel industry for twenty years, then a few more in real estate and then a few more in the automotive and RV world. Once that was over, I decided I didn’t want to work for anyone else any longer and wanted to do what I wanted. So, lucky for me, I have an extremely supportive wife who tolerates me on most days and she said “Go for it!”.  

I have always had a fascination with well made wooden crafts. When we would go to Hawaii and wander through shops, I was always drawn to the handmade wooden items like Koa wood boxes and vases, or small tables made from exotic woods. When we have visited LaConner, I  inevitably walk into The Wood Merchant and have to be drug out because I could spend hours just looking at the various pieces of furniture, boxes, games and knick knacks. When I was doing this, I was always thinking that I could do that. Of course, I had a limited set of tools and very little skill to speak of, but I was determined to make something that someone would want to buy from me.  

So, I started out by building a wall in the garage of our house that gave me a 12 by 14 foot space to work in. I built a little workbench and took a few tools from my dad’s garage to compliment the limited tool set I had and just started experimenting. I spent hours watching YouTube videos of people that had built a woodworking business from nothing and as I watched them try different things, I would head out to the garage to try it myself. Then life got in the way.  

A few months into my starting a little business, a pandemic took over and with the change in everyone’s travel habits, we decided to take advantage of that change and move. With that move, we wanted to make sure we would have room for my parents to come along, but have their own space and with any luck, more room for my woodworking.  So we found a house that had a detached garage that we thought would make a perfect conversion to a small home for my parents. After we moved in. I set out to wall off the garage once again while I was searching for a drafter/engineer to come up with plans for the garage conversion. This time, I managed to get 14  by 28 feet. I finally have room, but it’s still tiny because I now had more tools.  

The conversion of the garage for my parents was all supposed to be done by a contractor who quit before the project even really got started. Since every contractor under the sun had more business than they could deal with at the time, we were in a really bad spot. I figured I would just do it myself. I sent out an SOS text not thinking anything would come of it, but I got lucky. There was a small contractor, who happened to be friends with a cousin of mine who agreed to help. Without them, I would still be working on the addition. Anyway, a couple of years later and a couple of other house projects out of the way, I can now focus all of my time doing what I want to do and that is making cool things out of wood (and epoxy and some metal once in a while).  

I have made boxes, cutting boards, picture frames, tables, desks, Christmas stocking holders, signs, business card holders, pizza peels, etc. etc. you get the idea. I am open to making just about anything and would love to help you with whatever it is you’re looking for but just cannot seem to find. My family and friends often come to me with things they have seen but want them to be slightly different and say, “I know a guy…” So the next time you want something, you now can say you know a guy…and contact me. 

“Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” 

― Mark Twain