What I've been working on for Christmas gifts.

[cooperhawk]

Broken Marine first got me interested in knife making and Jantz Supply a couple of years back. Since then I have
purchased several kits and made custom knives for family and friends when I have time.
For several years I have made cutting boards, serving trays, ect out of Red Oak and giving them as Christmas gifts.
Our daughters especially like them as it comes from Dad with love.

Anyway, this year I purchased meat carving sets from Jantz and have been making custom red oak handles that
match the other items I have made for them. I'm on my fifth set right now as the demand grows.

https://knifemaking.com/products/ss807-carving-set

I finish them all with Mineral Oil and they make nice looking gifts.

I suddenly learned that I was going to be one set short so I ordered another kit from Jantz Wednesday and it came
this morning. That's really quick.

[BrokenolMarine]

I am glad to hear you are enjoying the hobby as well. I love Jantz, they are great folks to work with, and they have a big sale going on. I have sent a lot of folk their way and haven't gotten any negative feedback yet.

I have made a lot of knives using their blanks, and have added a lot of their tools to my knife bench. That display case is nearly full now.

filling up.jpg (1.2 MiB) Viewed 891 times

I said nearly... I can fit a few more in, or take some of the earlier ones out...

[Ozarkwoodswalker]

A beautiful set of knives for sure!

[cooperhawk]

I am glad to hear you are enjoying the hobby as well. I love Jantz, they are great folks to work with, and they have a big sale going on. I have sent a lot of folk their way and haven't gotten any negative feedback yet.

I have made several from their kits or blanks and enjoy doing so. I should have taken pictures of them, but didn't, and
gave most of them away to family and close friends.

I like to use materials that come from the homestead and as a result most are handled with red oak. I did do a couple of
knives with walnut though.

Jantz is a great outfit.

[BrokenolMarine]

The spalted maple came from a tree we grew from a stick that came from a catalog. Much of the black walnut came from my LE mentor's farm, and my father gave me the mahogany. It was edge trim from the 19th hole bar at the Golf Course and he scored the table tops when they redecorated. The stag came from my daughter's deer. Like you, I'll often try to make the scales have meaning. When you can, it makes each project just a bit more special.

[cooperhawk]

This is one of my first efforts using some black walnut from our property.

The Wife loves it.

Walnut paring knife.jpg (30.49 KiB) Viewed 873 times

At this point there was no finish on it. I later oil finished it.

[cooperhawk]

Here is the finished knife along with one I did in red oak that is unfinished.

[BrokenolMarine]

I love using the oil finish and then waxing them. If they get a ding, you just touch up the ding, reoil and wax, and boom, back in business. You don't have to refinish the entire knife. Watco Oil comes in various tints, and the basics are available at Home Depot. I use the Natural, Golden Oak, Medium/Dark Walnut the most. They give you an nice protection, and wipe on and buff. Not hard to use and very little cleanup. Toss the application rag, buff with a clean one.

[cooperhawk]

I'm just using regular Mineral Oil on them. I have some Watco that I use on my walnut gun cabinet.
Here are some cutting boards I made a while back using only Mineral Oil. I gave them all to our children
and they can just reoil them from time to time and they stay nice looking.

[BrokenolMarine]

Sweet. I did cutting boards one year for Christmas. I think I did Seven. Took a couple months.
They are all still holding up. NONE of them actually used them although they are made to be USED....
They say they are too pretty to be used.

[cooperhawk]

Last year I made several serving trays for meat. They are of our native Red Oak and have been planed down and routed with a so called blood groove in them as well. I gave them to Carol, our daughters, and also some friends.

This year I purchased seven cutlery sets from Jantz Supply and installed Red Oak handles on them. Each of the ladies who got serving trays received a cutlery set for Christmas. I guess they all liked them.

This is Carol's and the picture is of the Prime Rib Roast that she made for Christmas Eve Dinner. My son in law then did the honors carving the meat. ( I like to make him feel he is important to all our family traditions). (He's a really nice guy).

The Prime Rib was wonderful. Grain fed, lots of fat for flavor, Medium Rare, extremely tender. There was very little left.

Cutlery set with prime rib.jpg (124.81 KiB) Viewed 458 times

[BrokenolMarine]

Very nice work. Nice to see them used. Miss T loves the knives I made her and uses them all the time. I'm sure your gifts will become kitchen favorites.

[cooperhawk]

Although in the picture it looks small, the roast is 12 lbs. and the tray is 20 inches long.

I just ordered eight steak knives to go along with the cutlery set.