Moon River for Moon Willow

Oh My Gosh!!... I've been a month without an update!!!
So sorry to all of you! Well, Things have indeed been very busy and there is much happening. I will update you all in the days to come. For now though, an update on "Moon Willow Point".
We moved the pieces for the bed back to the shop and they were just too heavy to be functional. We slimmed the headboard down, laid out the three rivers for the headboard and started roughing out the rivers the islands, and the point...
We still have issues with weight and the overall size of the posts necessary to support the headboard. We may have to consider an alternative. Perhaps a wall hung headboard, we'll see. This is beginning to take shape as a beautiful work! Very exciting!

The spruce is loose

Just a heads up to everyone, We have a potential to acquire 9 Norway spruce trees 2-3' in diameter an 60 to 80' tall. Anyone with a future project that would have an interest in utilizing these please let us know. We could make some pretty significant decorative timbers from this, wall paneling, flooring,?????????
Lets get creative!
Please help us find a home for this material before it becomes landfill
Thank you!

A quick note

Hey everyone,
We came across about 800 or 900 board feet of 4/4 material from Peters Township. We have a mix of oak, cherry, elm, and locust. Now there's an interesting looking floor!!? Anyone have any projects for this please let us know. Just came out of the kiln this week and ready to be used.
As always, first come...

Peakes Peeks

A base for a local sculptor's work is a pleasure and an honor for Urban Tree Forge... as we are asked to help with and collaborate on a piece with Elvira Peake from The Clay Place. We went on a hunt for a selection of possibilities for our wonderful friend then roughed out a couple to choose from. Then it's on to "Baking Day" as we turn up the heat on any critters that may have taken up residency in our piece. Soon we hope to be showing at the Elan Fine Arts Gallery in Sewickley when we show together with more of our friends from the Society of Sculptors.
Keep an eye out for more progress as we develop this further....

Moon Willow moving

Hey everyone, thanks for checking in.

Yesterday we milled and then moved Moon Willow to the Urban Tree Forge for fabrication. Lots of heavy lifting! I can hardly wait to get a forklift for the shop, and our jib crane installed... will make some of this less challenging... I hope.

Check the first picture as we prepare to slab our willow with an Alaska mill... That's a 5 foot bar on the Stihl sitting on the back of the truck. We needed it to be able to span the "Y" of our headboard. Then we decided to test the limits of the truck, not to mention the tolerance of our friend officer "Ed" over in Sewickley as we loaded the headboard onto the truck for delivery to the Urban Tree Forge. Wayne Blumling has been great to work with and ever patient as we utilized his yard for the first stages of this project. Thanks again Wayne!

Tomorrow we'll be on Washington Blvd... laying out the pieces for the bed and commencing with the fun part... making this come together...

red oak white oak maple and more

Does anyone want a hardwood floor? This week has been pretty busy... we milled the oaks and a soft maple with Rich Haviland's sawmill service. He was wonderful to work with, but he sure throws around lots of saw dust. Look at the pile in front of the mill in the first picture. That was on the second log. We did 3 more after this. We had slabs over 16" wide!

Moon Willow Point:

Moon Willow Point... closer to reality today!!
Hey everyone,
Spent our Saturday afternoon with Wayne's Crane service getting some urban forest logs ready for a local sawyer, Rich Haviland to come mill them for us... We have 5 logs of oak from two trees for a potential flooring project and the willow is destined to become a bed with a sculptural headboard representing Pittsburgh's 3 rivers and point.
The great thing is between the oaks and the willow I should have enough revenue to plant at least 6 trees, maybe 8. Hopefully 2 street trees and the remainder in our parks or greenways.

In the morning I went to a local tree planting event as a tree tender volunteer representing Friends of the Pittsburgh urban Forest... The event was a Tree vitalize planting in conjunction with the Mt Washington CDC from what I understand.
Alas,... I soon learned the planting was to be Sunday and not Saturday. I spent a good hour or more looking before I found anyone. I found 2 members of the CDC getting mulch dropped off @ the site and learned I was a day early.
Since I wasn't able to be of service to these folks this day, I took a walk back into the scenic byway park and planted some seeds of my own:
I planted 6 oak acorns, 4 beechnuts, and a horse chestnut. I wanted some of these planted as a little something in remembrance of my brother Eric for his birthday. Happy Birthday Eric!!
I noticed our woods are in some dire straights!! I saw vines growing up many of the trees and I can see they cause much stress in our local forest. Many of the trees prevalent in our woods also seem to be of a very limited range of species. I think perhaps many species had been harvested in our city's younger days and have not recovered.... I sure hope that I can contribute to the recovery efforts...
More to come people, please stay tuned!!