The program for our December 6 meeting will be our 4th Annual Christmas Party at Hillcrest Lodge. All members are invited to bring their spouse (or date) for what will be a good time. We’ll have our Toys 4 Tots Benefit Raffle, our annual Woodworking Challenge, presentation of the club’s Spirit Award, and election of next year’s officers.

This year’s event will be different in that we won’t be having a sit-down potluck dinner. Instead we are expanding the social hour and asking members to bring a small dessert or appetizer. We’ll be providing the usual cheese table, coffee, hot cider and bottled water. Please note that we won’t be using the lodge kitchen this year so please bring food items that don’t need cooking or warming up. If you are unable to bring a food item, please still come to the meeting. We’ll have a donation bucket for Toys 4 Tots if you want to put in a few dollars as your contribution to the evening.

The social hour will be from 6:00pm to 7:30pm and and this will be your chance to view raffle items and purchase your raffle tickets. The evening program will begin at 7:30pm.

For this meeting only, we are asking that you enter through the Hillcrest Lodge main entrance on the west side of the building. This will allow you to drop off your food items and woodworking projects as well as pick up a name tag. The sidewalk leading to the main entrance is off the west side of the parking lot about 75 feet south of the lodge.

All club members should have received an e-mail invitation. Please help us plan your evening by RSVP’ing. We look forward to seeing all of you there.

Our November program is primarily to celebrate the hard work that our members put in making toys for needy children in our area. We will present our handmade custom wooden toys to the Marine Corps during the meeting.

Nomination of Officers
We need you! We need leadership for the following committees:
Membership
Education
Programs and Shows
Vice-President
Members at Large

You don’t have to know all about these committees. There are many great mentors in the club and all of the committees have members who volunteer their time. Now is the time to step up and help to keep us the most distinguished woodworking club in the northern hemisphere!

The October speaker is John Miller, an owner and manager of Cascade Joinery, in Ferndale, WA. He has spent his entire career in construction and cabinet making, working first in cabinet shops and later in 3 timber frame companies. John helped start Dreaming Creek Timber Frame Homes in 1991, where he spurred its growth from creating timber frames with portable power tools to Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machines. John came to Cascade Joinery in 2006, where he is able to work in the field as well as the office for clients up and down the west coast, including Alaska and Hawaii. John has been active in national organizations, such as the Timber Framer’s Guild and Timber Frame Business Council, including terms as President of both.

John will be speaking about Cascade Joinery and the process of timber framing. He will cover the materials used and how they are prepared. He will talk about using hand, power tools, and (CNC) Machines to cut large scale joinery and will also cover the process of timber frame projects from shop drawings to installation. The talk will wind up with a slide show of completed projects. If you’re interested in the beautiful art of timber framing or how to create joinery measured in inches, rather than eighths, this is the program for you.

Learn more about Cascade Joinery at www.cascadejoinery.com

On Saturday, August 13th, Val and Laura Matthews will host the annual picnic and tool auction from 1-4pm.

Our traditional combined Northwest Corner Woodworkers Association (NCWA) and Northwest Washington Woodturners (NWWWT) event takes the place of our normal monthly meeting. There is lots of room for parking. Bring tools you want to auction, and bid on something you find that you can’t live without. All you have to do is show up with a side dish (salad, desert or whatever), something cool to drink, and a lawn chair or two. Burgers, hotdogs, brats, fixings, soft drinks, water, paper plates, plastic ware and napkins are provided. Details on the auction process and entry form are in this newsletter. Serving will begin earlier this year, as last year the wait time was too long. Expect to eat about 2 PM. This year, the Woodworkers are cooking!

The annual silent auction is an excellent opportunity to sell tools, wood, or just about anything related to your shop! The rules are pretty simple. The seller displays the item for sale with a sales sheet listing the item, a short description of the item condition (e.g. new, works good, needs repair, etc), seller’s name, minimum acceptable bid if the seller wishes to state one. Anyone interested in the item simply enters a bid and their name. Anyone else interested in the same item enters a higher bid on the next line. Normally, bids should advance by at least 10% over the previous bid. Check back often to see if you are still the highest bidder. When the cutoff time is announced, the highest bidder wins the item provided their bid exceeds the stated minimum bid. The bidder then pays the seller, so don’t forget to bring money or your checkbook! You never know what might show up for sale!