The first wood project I recall volunteering to make, on my own was a simple napkin holder.  Sure, in wood shop in about the 8th grade, I made a wooden trash can, but that was not entirely voluntary, although it held up well for many, many years and because, as imperfect as it was, my mother refused to toss it out! Thanks, Mom!

As you can see by the photos, this should have been a fairly straightforward project with a very low degree of difficulty.  Unfortunately, I did everything I could to "shoot myself in the foot" with one simple, last minute decision! Here I was, an inexperienced wood worker, with limited tools, and I chose to take a simple afternoon project and flip it into a challenge for my limited skills!  For some odd reason, I decided to add some "decor" into it by using two different wood species, giving it the slightest bit of pizzazz!

Not having a clue as to how to proceed, I just came out swinging, hoping for the best and telling myself repeatedly "what's the worst that could happen"?

So, I began by taking two different wood species and cutting them into strips of manageable pieces, each about a foot long and about 1/4" thick. I then took those 1/4" thick pieces, laid them flat and cut them into 3/4" wide pieces.  Next, I then took the 1/4" thick X 3/4" wide strips, laid them flat and glued and clamped them edge to edge to one another creating the "every other strip is a different wood" look!  That created a rather large, flat piece of wood, with the entire piece being about 1/4" thick. Then, in order to add one more small element of decor, I cut the pieces that would actually be afixed or installed vertically to hold the napkins in place, into 4" wide X 4 5/8" pieces, cut so that the wood strips all now, when standing vertically, ran at a 45 degree angle. Remember now, I did not have a vast amount of either woodworking tools nor the experience to do what I wanted to accomplish.  So, again, I just charged forward, determined to make it work, but also determined to do it safely!  I did have a chop saw (a rotating miter saw and a table saw).  The final piece would be the base of the napkin holder which I decided would be one solid piece of the darker of the two woods I was using. Before cutting that piece down to the final dimensions, I took a piece of that wood that was about 6" wide X 6' long X 3/4" thick and drew out, on that board, what I wanted the exact, final size of the base of the napkin holder to be, which would be 4 1/2" wide X 5" long X 3/4" thick. I then marked exactly where the two vertical pieces would be located. I had already determined that I wanted the two vertical pieces to be sit down into the base piece at least 3/8" to give the two sides strength over time.  I then measured the width of the blade on my table saw, which was right at 1/8".  Now, having determined the location for the two vertical pieces, I placed the large board with all the markings on it onto the chop saw base and slowly lowered the blade, trying to ensure at the deepest point I wanted, that I would not be cutting outside of the lines marking the overall width of the vertical pieces, which, again, was 4". With a 10" diameter saw blade, my cut was not allowed to be too deep due to the short overall length of the cut. I then slide the board over just a small amount and repeated the small, shallow cut into the base piece to ensure the 1/4" thick vertical pieces would fit.  I then repeated this process on the other side.  Once that was completed, I began removing additional wood from the base by using hand tools! This was a very slow process but I was determined NOT to hurry and end up creating a larger than desired "slot" for the vertical pieces! I mostly used a box cutter with new, unused blades!  Once I had the slot cut and the vertical pieces fit, I put some wood glue into the slots and installed the vertical pieces. I was finally done!

Little did I know that, in time, that simple, small project would get me started both on a path towards working with wood as a hobby, but as livelihood as well!

Sorry I got so long-winded!  Just couldn't figure any other way to share my first time trying to do something while also figuring it out on the fly! Fortunately, I learned a few things over the years, accrued some tools and, over time, have built far too many items to even recall them all!  But I'll tell you what...that first time sure was memorable! Oh! I built that in about the early 1990's and it is still sitting on our dining room table, being used every day! Hmmm...must have done something right! 

Please feel free to comment and let me know what you think! Also, feel free to ask questions, share your projects or just say "Hey!"