Gift idea help????

Hi Mike

It'll make make both of you feel good if you make something for a close friend I'm sure.

So how about a smooth round bottom popcorn type bowl, you don't have to be able to see, to be able to feel just the smooth wood, should make him feel good, with or without popcorn in it.

Have fun and take care Leo Van Der Loo

Mike Burr wrote:

--If you can find it at a used book store (currently out of print) get him a copy of "Making Mechanical Marvels in Wood", which includes many neat ideas for kinematic contraptions. They range from simple to complex and might make for good projects for someone with failing eyesight. They can all be held in the hand and cranking the mechanisms and feeling the widgets go round might be good tactile feedback. Here's a link to fotos of one I made:

I dont know if he would be interested , but you could make some wooden drink coasters , and carve the outlines so he could do a chip carved pattern in them . I dunno if that would be too safe ?

A bowl sounds like a good idea , maybe with some inscribed lines to indicate quantities.

Instead of making him something that may show him just him what he's lost, instead, encourage him to get back into woodworking, so he can see how little he's lost. Get him a braile tape measure or some other tool made for the blind. Here is a company that supplies all sorts of items to hospitals and clinics. Oddly, I have bought my grand kids some of these interesting and well made items as gifts. You might look for a vision impaired catalog, too. Dan

> To make kindling is human, to finish the projet divine. To spell correctly is heavenly. (project)

Sign on the mess hall at the Key Largo naval base: To fly is heavenly, to hover divine. There was a rivalry between the fixed wing and rotary wing pilots.

I'm not sure what you should get him Mike, but whatever it is make sure its not a saw! I know a fellow with 'failing' vision who still uses one - scares the hell out of me!

Tom

might be of interest, especially the paragraph just above the second photo that starts "The question I most often hear".

Google "blind cabinetmaker" and you'll find some more accounts by people in that situation.

--

--John to email, dial "usenet" and validate (was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)

"Tom Storey" wrote in news:6bc9h.350338$5R2.108014@pd7urf3no:

Awkward posting order. Sorry.

In or near Berkeley, CA is a state training school for newly blind people, generally speaking, adults. They have a fully functioning woodshop, including power tools. Their director came and spoke to our woodworking club, and really changed our minds about 'handicaps'.

I'm glad I can still see well enough. But to know there are places which help people adjust to changes in their tools - that's great!

Patriarch

Thankfully, I don't know what blind woodworkers use to keep at the craft, but I'd guess that a good set of wood rasps and files might come in handy, if the guy has any interest in doing something really tactile like carving, and there's any concern over really sharp cutting edges. A Dremel might be a handy thing, too.

Good ideas so far. I like Leo's Idea of the bowl and also adding the tactile markings on the external surface. I also like the wood coasters. I've got some spare cyprus that would deffinately work for that and is fairly resistant to soaking up more fluid. I wanted to show him that we had a lot in common, not just our love of music. He was one of the reasons I started a more ernest attempt in working with wood and eventually onto wood turning. I'm not sure he ever ventured into turning, but wanted to show him what the world of turning felt like. He is currently in Mississippi going through one of the schools to assist with the new dissability, and was thinking about going into the wood working classes. I wanted to make him something that he could use, but that might also help to motivate him to feel the wood again.

Mike

To make kindling is human, to finish the "project" divine.

Mike Good luck to your inlaw. When I was living in Sherbrooke Village, NS a few years ago, an old friend (how old? his wife changed my diapers when I was a baby) lost his vision overnight due to diabetes. He never gave up. We ran ropes to the mail box and the barn so he could get the mail and feed the horse. I tilled the garden over and ran strings for rows. He planted and weeded by feel. One day I went to the house and asked his wife where he was. She replied he was in the cellar. I opened the door to pitch blackness. As I turned on the light I heard the power saw running. He was making TV tables for friends. I have one down stairs. It scared me half to death but he enjoyed his wood working until cancer finally got him. He was great guy I will always miss. Good luck to your friend.