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Here's a cool new feature added to SSV...Forum Views! Here is a quick video demonstration of how this works. Traditional View - This is the forum view you're most used to. This is the default view, which makes browsing forums easy. I also find it easier to create new forum threads in this view. Grid View - This shows each of the forums in a nice grid with pictures. Not my favorite, but it looks nice. Dynamic View - This is a great way to keep up with what's new in the forums. It shows the latest threads and comments. You can filter it to show only the forums you like to read. Hopefully, folks will enjoy these new options and don't find it too confusing. If we don't like it, I can easily remove the forum view options and go back to what we had.

Story time! When I first started scroll sawing, I started a blog called Scroll Saw Goodies where I posted resources and tutorials. I also started making a few videos on YouTube under the same name and sold a few patterns. Eventually, this lead me to creating Scroll Saw Village. I've always kept the two separate. But, as you can imagine, maintaining two websites is a lot of work. So I've been working on a new section on SSV where I'm going to port over some of these older projects. I created a few new areas: Project Workshop - These are project videos. These tutorials take you step-by-step as I build a scroll sawn project. I'm going to try to include written instructions as well. I'll be adding a variety of projects over time, too. Everybody has free access to this. It's also be posted on YouTube and probably FaceBook. Project Workshop Patterns - I used to sell patterns that I used on my blog. But it's tough to have the patterns in two places. So, instead of selling them individually, I'm going to give free access to SSV Patrons as a thank you for supporting SSV. Design Workshop - This area is is for design tutorials. Usually, these will be tutorials on how I designed the pattern used in the Project Workshop. But I'll also have other design tutorials, too. This is for folks who are interested in the design process. Access to these tutorials are for SSV Silver & Gold Patrons. Again, thank you for supporting SSV! I've been messing with these sections for about 6 weeks now, and I think I have it ready for prime time. This is an experiment that I'm hoping folks will enjoy. Anyway, here is the first project. I'll be porting over the older ones soon. Enjoy!

Howdy All. I don't think Discord chat room went over too well, so I went back to the drawing board. I added some new software to SSV to accommodate a new chat room that's more integrated into the site. That way you don't have to sign up for a new service. The group chat room is in the navigation bar at the top of the screen. There is also a link in the lower right corner of your screen so you can have it open as you browse SSV (kinda the same way Facebook works). Browse and chat. As an added bonus, if you're a SSV Patron, you can also start a private chat with another member or create a private group chat. This is an extra feature for SSV Patrons as a thank you for supporting this site. Anyway, kick the tires a bit and let me know how it's working.

Hi All. The Village University has moved to it's own section! It is now located under the Resources tab in the top menu. You can also get there by clicking here. Back in 2009, we taught a couple of in-depth classes on how to design your own scroll saw patterns. One on designing portrait patterns using GIMP, and another on designing patterns using Inkscape. These were originally in the forum, which worked pretty well. However, in the future, I'd like to offer other classes, too. So I needed a better way to organize and manage the classes without cluttering up the main forum. So, I purchased an add-on module for the forum that manages online courses. The software is currently in beta, but I was able go get early access since I'm also supporting the developer. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles programmed yet, but it seems to be stable and a should fit our needs nicely. As a first step, I moved the original pattern making classes to this new section. When I moved the classes, I went through and updated the links, graphics, and language. So everything should be complete and easy to read and follow along. In order to view the lessons or participate in the class discussion, you must first enroll in the class. This is easy. On the front page of the class, there's a big green Enroll button you can click. Then you have access to the class and lessons. Each class has a video, written instructions, screenshots, assignments, reference materials, and a place to ask questions or add comments. On the top-left of each lesson, there's a button you can mark a lesson as Complete. This is a good way to remember where you left off. You'll also have a list of your enrolled classes on your profile page. I'm super excited about this. In the future, I hope to offer other classes covering a variety of subjects. My continued goal is to support the scroll saw community and bring you resources to take your hobby to the next level. I hope you enjoy this new addition to our humble community.

Howdy all. I just wanted to let you know we added a new Leaderboards feature. You can find this under the Community Tab (also at the bottom of the forum in the menu) Each day, the software tallies the posts and reactions from our members. The leaderboard will show which member got the most reputation/reactions to their posts during a 30 day period and awards them top ranks. You can change the period of time in the upper right corner to see who has the most for the day, week, year, all time, etc. Popular posts - This looks at content that has the most reactions in a particular thread. This is a really cool way to find the most interesting content during that time period. That way, you don't miss the good stuff. Past Leaders tab - That shows which members got the most reactions to their posts each day. Members who get top ranks each day get an award shown on their profile page. Top Members tab - This shows which members rank in the top for a specific category. By default, it's post count and reputation level. But you can sort it by who has the most images, etc. Under each of these tabs, you can follow a member and get notified when they publish something. You can also take a closer look at the stuff they have posted in the past. I think this is a really neat feature. Try not to think of it as a contest. Instead, think of it as a fun way to recognize some of our fellow members who put a lot of effort into SSV by providing great feedback and advice. I find the most valuable part is the Popular Content section. That's super cool.

Howdy All. All kinds of things happening behind the curtain. Most of it is admin/techy stuff and troubleshooting. But I did make a nice improvement to our SSV Supporter system and simplified the process! We now have 1 screen that shows all of the subscription options for SSV Patrons. You can only have 1 active subscription active at one time and this will easily manage that. You'll have the option of switching between plans, which is much easier with this new system. Updating and renewing is also easy to find without having to dig through menus. You can find the subscriptions or manage your subscriptions under the Support SSV tab in the navigation bar. You can also manage your subscriptions in the pulldown menu in the upper right corner of the website (next to your avatar). It's located under the Settings section and called Manage Subscriptions. On your profile page, you'll see a new block in the left column showing your supporter status, which is a nice touch. I've also changed the Supporter tiers a bit. The standard supporter level remains at $10/yr and that works pretty well. We have a handful of folks who choose to support SSV on a monthly basis of $5/month at the gold level. We also had a silver level at $3/month, which was a complete flop. I had several folks want to support SSV a bit more, but the jump from $10/year for the SSV Patron to $60/year for SSV Gold Patron pretty steep. So I changed the Silver level from $3/month to $20/YEAR instead. So I figured the $20/year easier to digest. All options now offer Paypal or Stripe to process payment and offers handy recurring payment. Payment info isn't stored on SSV for securtity reasons and payment processing is taken care of by either Paypal or Stripe. Anyway, the new system should be a bit easier to manage. Everything seemed to go well during the conversion. But if you see anything strange or you need help switching between plans, please let me know. I'm happy to help. Again, thank you for your continued support! I greatly appreciate it!

Howdy All. I've mentioned in this post that I'm moving the Scroll Saw Reviews to it's own section. It is now located under the Resources tab in the navigation bar. I did this for a couple of reasons. First, I'm trying to simplify the forum a bit. This will help declutter the main forum page. Second, while the reviews forum was useful, it was really cumbersome to update. It required the admin to update the information, or to create a new saw review. Now with their own section, members can add new saws and edit the information on the saws really easy. To add a new saw, just click "Add New Scroll Saw" on the main page. To update information on a saw, go to that page's saw and click the green button that says "Update Scroll Saw Information". @meflick had an awesome idea in this post to have a area to upload scroll saw manuals. (Goodness knows I almost always misplace my manuals). Well, it took me awhile, but I figured out how to upload manuals for these scroll saws. Just go to your saw and click "Update Scroll Saw Information" and there's a section where you can upload a manual. You can upload different versions, for some of those old saws that has had several over the years. Here's How You Can Help? Here's where I can use your help. I know many of you created well thought out reviews for your saw. This new section has a Reviews tab where you can give it a star rating and a proper review. The comments tab is where all the posts from the forum got moved to. If you wrote a proper review, can you copy/past it in the Reviews tab and give it a star rating? This will be super helpful for folks buying a new scroll saw. The more reviews there are, the better they feel when purchasing. If you have a scroll saw but haven't given it a review, please do so. If you don't see your saw listed, please add it. You don't have to know all of the information. Just fill in what you can. (Please make sure your saw isn't listed first. We don't want duplicate records) If you have one of these saws, please look over the information. If anything is missing or incorrect, please update it by clicking "Update Scroll Saw Information" and filling in the correct information. If you have one of these saws, click the Follow button on that saw to be notified when someone adds a review or a comment. Anyway, I hope you find this new section useful and a little easier to use than the last one. And more than that, I hope folks looking for a scroll saw will find this valuable in helping them pick the right scroll saw for themselves....and suck them into our devious hobby.

Howdy All. I just added a new feature which I think will be fun. We're adding achievement awards. These are fun little awards for certain things. Such as medals for participating in challenges or contests, contributing to the Ornaments For Charity ebook, participating in projects or events. There are also trophies that are unlocked by reaching certain milestones, like uploading a profile pic, getting a certain amount of posts, uploading to your gallery, getting or giving a certain amount of post reactions, etc. They don't do much other than being a fun way to recognize folks who participate in SSV. The medal and trophies will show up on your profile page. There will also be a nice little icon below your name on forum posts showing the last 5 or so awards (you can see an example under my name). You'll be able to hide specific awards from your profile page if you want to. But I think it's fun to see. You'll start to see notifications pop up in your feed. Right now, I'm awarding them to participants on the monthly Scroll Saw Challenge going back to last October. After that, I'll slowly add new awards.