Many of you received new tools at Christmas and are contemplating the perfect project to put that new tool to use. The process of designing a future project can often take more time than the construction process. Magazine articles and books are excellent resources that can quickly provide a design. Examining pieces of furniture that attract us also can be useful in deciding on a final design. We often start the design process by looking at furniture books in our own collection. Our BAWA library has a large and ever expanding selection of excellent books on building and designing furniture. Public libraries are also a good source of woodworking books. Woodworking magazines can be extremely useful in generating ideas that appeal to us, however finding an article on a specific project in a large stack of magazines can be a daunting task. Many magazines have now put their indexes on line, making this task easier. An index to 36 woodworking magazines published in the United States, Canada and England can be obtained from the Woodworking Indexing. http://www.woodworkersindexing.com/

This is an excellent resource that quickly provides a list of all articles on specific woodworking topics. Magazines articles can be obtained from inter-library loan if your local library does not have the magazine in its collection. Or you can now obtain on-line articles for a nominal fee from most of the magazine publishers. I am looking forward to seeing some beautiful pieces of furniture at our show and tell sessions during the coming year. Seeing the work that a BAWA member has done can inspire all of us to be a little more adventurous in our next project.