How Did You Get Started?

[Travis]

One of my favorite things to ask people is how they got started in a particular hobby.  Their stories are really interesting and you can learn a lot about them.  So h'bout it?  How did you get started in scrolling?  We're not looking for a short 1 sentence reply.  Really tell us your story.  How did you discover scrolling?  Why did you decide you wanted to give this a try?  What was your first project?  How did it go?

[Robert Phillips]

I bought a scrollsaw to help build a new workbench I wanted some way of making the handles for the drawers.

[Chris Hayes]

My grandfather was my role model for all things woodworking. As I came to appreciate the art more deeply, I fell in love with the detail found in scroll sawn fretwork. The first tool I ever bought for myself was a scroll saw, and I've been hooked ever since!

[tony coleman]

when i was about five my brother made some elephant shaped bookends,and i thaught this was somthing great too be able too do with a saw,many years later a uncle of mine made a piece for my dad,and shortly after he saw me trying too cut pieces with a coping saw,so he gave me one of his old fretsaws.it has only been in the last 5 years or so that i have a electric saw.

[don in brooklin on]

I have been a woodworker since I was in grade 7 (60 years ago).  My dad was an excellent woodworker and made sure I took every shop class available.

 

After a busy career, I retired early (freedom 55) and moved to a new house with the understanding that I would have enough room for a shop.  I have done lots of cabinet work and and lathe work but the only scrolling I really did was to do all the porch posts on the old house we restored. It was a lot of sanding after using dad's old one speed craftman scroll saw. 

 

In 2010, we decided the old house was too much work and my wife wanted to be closer to the grandkids so we moved to Brooklin. At the same time, I joined the Durham Woodworkers Club and one of the first seminars I attended was for scrolling and we did the wolf below.  My new house had a small shop and I thought this looked like fun so I bought a EX-21 and never looked back.

 

I have a short attention span so I cycle back and forth between turning and the scrolling depending if I have a project lined up.

 

My goal for 2013 was to do some Intarsia and do some "non round" bowls.  So far I have done 1 intarsai beginners piece and made a couple of bowls that ended up as firewood.  I recently got involved in a project to create wig stand for cancer patients and have spent most of my time on the lathe.  So far made 9 wig stands.  They are lots of fun as everyone is different and I know they go to a good cause.

 

don

 

[Docupton]

Long before I was made redundant from work, I would look at other peoples work on market stalls and in shop windows and think.. 'I could do that'. Trouble was I did not know how to do it, so I trawled the internet for almost a month looking at other peoples art and reading their comments. Scroll saws can be expensive, but with permission from her indoors I bought an £80 Erbauer, I now have an Excaliber 21, and thanks to sites like SSV and Steve Good, I have not looked back since..

[Forester]

I started as an hobby now doing it full time and employing my wife as well now.

[dave2882]

i was off work waiting for a back op so i had to find something i could do siting down i like to keep my self busy this works for me  have been doing it few 4 years now and love it i have a dewalt 788 theres not many in the uk its sites like this one that has helped me so i thank you for that all the best dave

[Jim Finn]

I had started to learn relief carving and was looking for functional items to decorate with carvings. I started making fireplace bellows with carved fronts and needed a scroll saw to cut out the basic shape of the wood for these. I eventually stopped carving on the bellows and now I make them, among other things, and on the face of the bellows I put in images using the double bevel inlay method.

[Clayton717]

I have always been into woodworking. My brother in law let me borrow his old Dremel scroll saw. It was a real pain to use needed an allen wrench to change blades in the blade holders(not attached to saw). I didn't do alot of inside cuts when I first started. I almost got turned off to scrolling because of that saw. 

 I saw cuttings a friend had that were cut on a scroll saw, that really interested me so I bought my own better saw. A Ryobi it was better but not by much, atleast the blade change was easy. It got me hooked. A few scroll saws later I now have the Dewalt.   The scroll saw is my most used tool. I use it on almost everything I make, even for some of my pens. I am really glad I didn't give up after the first saw, I enjoy scrolling and making things.

 

My name is Clayton and I AM addicted to SCROLLING.

[Uncle Ricky]

not much to say except that my brother got me started on it.

[multitom]

I have always beem interested in DIY especially carpentry (making shelves ,stands for the kitchen)and on weekends I use to work on outboard engines helping my marine engineer friend for fun getting my hand greased ,when I was working in the persian gulf. After retiring and relocationg to my country,One day while surfing the net and trying to get information on wood routers and other hand held tools, I came across Steve Good's website and that was the day that I was really HOOKED to this hobby,then began the search for the machine a whole lot of famous brands are available on the net but the custom duty and other reserve bank formalities in my country made it sound impossible to get the saw.

Some how found a distributor of PROXXON DSH in India and purchased one, did a lot of cutting ,self taught as so many of you are ,now I realize that I should have opted for a better saw. This saw is a entry level one and now from the past six months the blade clamps have been damaged plus the allen key screw tightening is a major pain in the neck. Temporarily I have found a solution.

I love this hobby , a big thank you to Steve Good for his free patterns and videos, I have learnt everything I know from his tutorials.

I started attempting patterns with a very big help from Don Robinson from the past eight months or so and trying my best to do a good job.

Not many scrollers in my part of the world so sourcing wood is also a problem but I am managing somehow .

I make them take pictures and give it away as gifts. That is my story

[loftyhermes]

When British Coal closed the mine in '93 I needed a hobby so I took up woodturning, then at a wood turning show in '95 I saw and bought a Delta 40-560 and now share my time between the two.

happy scrolling

Steve

[campasano]

I became interested in woodworking when I was in High School, I took a 6 week course in woodworking and liked it so much that I started to make things for friends and family. 60 plus years later I am still at it and love it as much now as I did when I was in my teens. I try to get out to my shop every day if possible.

 

Mike

[wombatie]

About 14 years ago I was doing folk art painting and the lady I was doing it with kept asking my husband who is a carpenter for different shapes in the end he went out and got himself a 16" Delta Scroll Saw.  Well it was sitting in the garage and it had only been there a week and I asked my husband to show me how it worked and he did.  Well that was it I was hooked.  I was never off it and my husband never got to use it.  I finally killed it but it gave my 5 very good years, then I got myself a DeWalt now I also have an Ex21.  I was happy to say that I had finally found something that I was good at and I am still hooked.

 

Marg

[Dan]

I always enjoyed working with wood. About 12 years ago, my wife wanted to get me something for Christmas, knew I liked tools, and bought me a scroll saw. I didn't know what to do with it, so I picked up my first woodworking magazine...Scroll Saw Woodworking and Crafts.

[koehler788]

Like most people, I love working with wood, I used to do a lot of interior woodwork as a part time income and a friend of mind wanted a valance over his sink. Well I go over to my brothers house and ask him if he ha a template for a design That I could route into the wood. Ha came up with a leaf design and told me to scroll it!

I looked at him like "What Foreign language are you speaking" So, I watched him put this beautiful design in the valance. (Customer Loved It).

Fast Forward--

My Brother died a couple of years after.

Fast Forward Again-

Two years later my Sister-in-law Called me over to help her move some furniture and when I was finished, She took me to the garage and asked me if  I would like to have his scrollsaw and everything that went with it. (She had a dream from my brother). We both started tearing up and i took it home set it up,

NEVER USED ONE BEFORE- And my first project (just from watching him) was one of Charles Dearnings Portraits.

Fell in Love with it and the rest is history

[gator]

well i guess it started as a young child. when i was 7-8 my dad built me a fort in the air on stilts.i have always buit stuff with wood. at that young age dreamed of saving my lawn mowing money and buying a drill then a saw . about that same time i saw this match stick church at the lone star museum "buckhorn saloon in San Antonio. always wanted to build things in miniature. years later was doing wood working "country crafts. a friend showed me a craftsman scroll saw pin blades. was hooked. the rest is history

[amazingkevin]

My  friend had the largest book store in broward county and probably the state and had everything ,past print.I remember the  magazines of scrolling that really impresst me.finally i moved a friend and he gave me a dremil tiny tiny scroll saw for airplaine (model) work.i tryed it ,liked it and had a friend draw out projects for me.all letters .Scrolled letters fascinates me to this day with the detail that can be had with the saw.

[tjcebula]

Bought a cheap scrollsaw and decided to give a try my 1st was a set of leaves, Then gradually expanded my horizon on things to do, after my dremel scrollsaw crapped out I bought a Dewault scrollsaw with a deeper throat and my creations started to roll. Glad I started this hobby it a relax tool for me after a bad day I just sit in my shop and let the mind juice flow to see what I can come up with   

     

Edited April 23, 2013 by tjcebula

[Kepy]

My interest started back in the 60's when I went to an auction with my Grandfather.  He bought a box of junk to me and I teased him all the way home about his junk.  Turned out it was an old Delta scrolling jigsaw that was all there only in pieces.  Once he got it together, I was fascinated and the laugh was on me.  In the 70's I found an identical saw at a garage sale and wound up with my own.  At the time, I wasn't aware of all the possibilities but did start doing Christmas ornaments every year that were dated and they became very popular with family and friends.  I had never seen a commercial pattern so made my own.

Fast forward to the 90's and when I was laid off from work found a craft business for sale and became a business owner.  Did a lot of custom cutting for tole painters.  Now I am retired or at least tired and just scroll for pleasure.

[heppnerguy]

I had gone to a small town weekend celebration, about 20+ years ago where they had some vendor booths. As I walked around I came upon one where a woman had an assortment of intarsia dog breeds. I was amazed that anyone could do something like that. I retired and moved to another part of our state where we had a small 16X16 shop and I was not sure how I was going to use it. I did have a scroll saw that I had purchased years before I moved and I was not happy with it because the wood jumped up and down and changing the blades was a pain, so I just sort of gave up on it. I remembered thee wonderful intarsia dogs that I had seen so many years ago and looked it up on the internet and read about how it was done. I decided to try a simple 7 piece pattern, that I drew on my own and discovered to my amazement the I could do that sort of thing. I actually had made the item on my band saw and not on my scroll saw. To my delight, I found out about scroll saw blades that could make a difference. I purchased some blades on line and things really improved from there. I never had an interest in scrolling because I have never cared for the 'colorbook' style of patterns that I thought of when I saw scroll items. there were no shaping and kind o a simple silhouette patterns. That simply did not appeal to me and still does not to this day. Searching for free intarsia patterns, I stumbled onto Steve Good's web page where I saw some 'woven basket' patterns. How could it be possible to make something like that? I decided to try a name, first to see if I could do that satisfactorily and to my amazement I could. So it was off the world of scrolling and I have loved it every since. I still do intarsia and enjoy it, but scrolling has become my real passion.

[Marvin]

Just wanted something to take my mind off my health, TV and the general state of affairs in DC.

[Phantom Scroller]

Well I started when I was 14 years old just a couple of years ago. lol  using a bandsaw and jigsaw and needed to make small cuts so bought my first scroll saw and I'm now on my third one after wearing my first two out.

 

I'm addicted and can't stop, been to scrollsaw addiction classes but didn't help. so I get my fix most days now. lol

 

Roly 

[cherie]

A very long story.  LOL.  

I have been at this for about 8 to 9 years I think.  Not really sure.  I started out with a Dremel and now use a Shopsmith.  I have given one seminar last year in OH, and have my own group on Facebook called the Elite Scrollers.  (which by the way is more than scrolling these days)  We welcome woodworkers of all kinds and we try to have monthly contests.

I came from the Free4All forum which is currently in the process of shutting down.  It is the only forum I found to be friendly and helpful in many ways and have met lots of very nice people.

I do mostly ornaments, but have done a few larger pieces and custom orders and have taken a step into designing portrait style patterns for other scrollers.