Easy-to-make box is perfect for a special gift   By Albert Baggetta I originally built these boxes in the shape of guitar  picks to make a unique place to store my picks. Then I added a curve here and there, and ended up with boxes that looked like little hearts. These are more universal and make nice gift boxes for Valentine’s Day and other special events. They are easy to make, and you can decorate them by adding an inlay to the top with any wood of your choose—including maple and redheart. Selecting the Wood I use a light wood with an attractive grain for the tops and bottoms o ..read more

Looking for variety and natural beauty? Make it maple! By Janette Square Maple is a broad term for roughly 200 species of trees of the genus Acer that grow all over the world. However, the North American lumber industry mainly uses two types: hard maple and soft maple. After learning about maple, try incorporating the wood into our heart-shaped boxes project. Hard maple, also known as sugar maple (Acer saccharum), is perhaps the most widely used variety in the furniture and woodworking industry. It is also one of the hardest domestic hardwoods in North America, with a Janka rating of ..read more

Don’t let its density deter you from falling in love with this tropical hardwood By Staff of Scroll Saw Woodworking & Crafts Redheart can refer to a number of wood species that boast a similar deep red color. The most common variety called redheart is also known as “chakte kok,” and grows from Mexico to as far south as Brazil and Paraguay. Its actual color can vary from a bright watermelon red to pink to a dark brownish-red. Like most tropical hardwoods, redheart can be dense and difficult to cut. But its rich, natural color makes it worth the effort. After learning about redheart, try inc ..read more

The Spring 2023 issue of Scroll Saw Woodworking & Crafts includes a variety of  fascinating features and techniques, as well as nature-themed projects and patterns. This issue is a part of the regular magazine subscription. It is also available from your favorite retailer or from Fox Chapel Publishing, foxchapelpublishing.com, 1-800-457-9112.  Purchase Our Spring Issue Here! Scroll down for a sneak peek of our spring projects! In This Issue   Features Scroll Saw Roundup Check out our latest breakdown of saws to try, from budget to top-tier By Kaylee ..read more

Gravity helps this toy race to the finish line By Paul Fellay Cut by Rolf Beuttenmuller In addition to their striking features, woodpeckers are notorious for, well, pecking wood. They use their long beaks to peck, drill, and drum wood for hours, relying on their strong tail feathers to support them as they cling to a tree trunk or branch. They also have two back toes to lean on! My woodpecker ramp walker does not have helpful toes, but it does have movable legs that will get it from point A to point B. All this dynamic toy needs is gravity to get moving.  Getting Started Pre-sand the b ..read more

Musician Paul Daher constructs an instrument fit for a symphony  By Kelly Umenhofer At the beginning of 2020, Paul Daher was looking for a project he could tackle at home during the COVID-19 lockdown. With his late father’s tools, Paul decided to build his childhood dream project—a harpsichord.   Did You Know? The harpsichord is a keyboard instrument in which the strings are plucked, rather than hit with a hammer.   The instrument caught Paul’s attention in high school, as he learned instrument tuning and repair from a professional piano technician. Althoug ..read more

Saw a stack of wooden and paper greeting cards By Gloria Cosgrove Cut by Rolf Beuttenmuller These seasonal designs are sized just right for greeting cards. You can stack-cut cardstock or thin plywood to make overlays for greeting cards, or use slightly thicker hardwood to create a card that doubles as an ornament. Learn more about stack-cutting here. You could also increase the size of the patterns to make wall hangings. Making the Cards To cut the pieces, make a stack of thin plywood or cardstock. Sandwich the stack between two pieces of 1/8″ (3mm) or 1/4″ (6mm) scrap plywood, wrap the sta ..read more

Use a practice pattern to learn a new way to stack blanks By John A. Nelson To hold together a stack of blanks, scrollers often drive small nails into the waste areas outside the pattern. But you usually end up cutting off both the scrap and the nails, and you are left trying to hold the stack together to finish the cuts. Taping the stack can cause the same problem and takes a ton of tape, and glue is a sticky mess.  I like using the tab, or ear, method of stack cutting. With this method, you drive nails into areas close to the pattern and only cut them off after finishing the rest of ..read more

The Winter 2022 issue of Scroll Saw Woodworking & Crafts includes a variety of  fascinating features and techniques, as well as festive and holiday-themed projects and patterns. This issue is a part of the regular magazine subscription. It is also available from your favorite retailer or from Fox Chapel Publishing, foxchapelpublishing.com, 1-800-457-9112.  Purchase Our Winter Issue Here! Scroll down for a sneak peek of our winter projects! In This Issue   Features Passion Projects Brad and Hazel Eklund put scraps to good use while celebrating th ..read more

This sweet design is a treat to cut and assemble By Sarah Lyn Chamberlain This time of year, there’s nothing better than a fresh batch of cookies baking in the oven. My family and I would always bake together, and gingerbread cookies were my favorite. This puzzle is an ode to the season and a delicious treat of my childhood.  Getting Started Choose a light wood; I prefer 3/4″ (1.9cm)-thick pine. Prepare the blank by sanding progressively through the grits to 220. Cover the surface with blue painter’s tape. For maximum stability, I recommend orienting the patterns with the grain running ..read more