But rest assured the dry season won’t last forever. As I’ve been sunning myself and sweat has been pouring down off my brow and stinging my eyes I’ve kept a log of the many things I plan to cover in upcoming episodes. I’ll share more of that with you shortly.

In the meantime, I had the chance to have a little fun answering some questions with Chris Landy over at The Lighthearted Woodworker, 12 questions to be exact. I’m really honored and appreciated the opportunity to be included.

If you haven’t visited Chris’ blog before click on this link to the article and then go explore, I have a feeling you’ll bookmark it and come back for more. 12 Lighthearted Question for Matt’s Basement Workshop.

Related posts:

1. 445 Kid’s Maple Bookcase Questions Answered (Hopefully)

In the mean time, I’ll be posting more Spoken Wood Podcast episodes, more Wood Talk Online Radio episodes as they become available and even the return of The Review Show as soon as I throw the kids out of the living room and reclaim my easy chair and remote control.

If you haven’t seen my “The Accident” video yet, you may want to check it out before you visit this link to my good friend Chuck Bender’s post over at his blog “Parings – A Woodworker’s Journal” Safety Week 2012 – Matt Vanderlist’s video.

Shortly after posting my episode about the accident Chuck contacted me to ask if he could write a post on his own blog talking about the incident, and then providing some more insight into what could’ve been done to prevent it.

It’s never easy to admit when you screwed up, and it’s even harder to listen to what someone else has to say about it. But the fact is, I wanted as many people as possible to learn from my mistake so hopefully they won’t make it themselves.

The goal of my video was to point out what I thought were the mistakes and missteps I made that contributed to the whole incident. What Chuck did was to take it one step further and nail them home.

Take a few minutes and read what he has to say. I know I did, and I can confidently tell you I’m very appreciative of the insight I’ve gained from it.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s hard for me to read some of what Chuck wrote. When you make a mistake as major as I did, it’s difficult to hear what someone else has to say about it. But I can guarantee the next time I fire up any of my routers, it’s Chuck’s advice I’ll be using to make it a safer task.

No related posts.

Regardless of which venue you choose to attend (or for a lucky few, both) you’ll find all the information about instructors, classes, vendors, night time events and just about everything you need to make preparations to attend at the Woodworking in America website www.woodworkinginamerica.com.

If you plan to attend either one of the events feel free to share your plans with your fellow online woodworkers by filling out the “2012 Woodworking Conference Buddy Tracker” put together by our good friend Aaron Marshall at the Garage Shop blog.

Related posts:

1. 430 Woodworking In America Highlights with Megan Fitzpatrick
2. Get woodworking week 2012
3. Woodworking in America 2010 and more

Thank you to all of you who have been so generous as to take the 2012 Audience Survey so far, the information we’ve gathered will be helpful in my attempts to convince advertisers that Matt’s Basement Workshop is a good investment for their advertising dollars. Of course what this means for you the audience, is that the show will continue to be produced free of charge and coming to you uninterrupted.

I promise to keep the advertising as limited as possible in the episodes themselves, and the ad spots on the website to companies and retailers who are related to woodworking as possible. Something not every website can promise these days.

If you haven’t taken the time to fill out the survey and include your information, please take a few minutes to answer some very basic questions. There’s no need to include private information such as your name, address or such. But if you want to be included in a drawing for a Matt’s Basement Workshop T-shirt all I ask is you fill in your email address where prompted. Even that is still held privately. It’s not meant for the advertisers, just a means for me to contact you if you’re the lucky winner.

The survey ends April 6, 2012 with the T-shirt drawing occurring on April 13, 2012. Hurry before it’s too late.

Related posts:

1. 2012 Audience Survey
2. Get woodworking week 2012
3. Spoken wood podcast no. 188

Let’s all give a huge CONGRATS to March’s Schwag winners. I’m sending emails out to the winners, so check your inbox if your name is listed below.

As always, if you didn’t win this month I’ve already started taking names for the April drawing. Head over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered for the drawing today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway. Good luck!

HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners Congrats to – Raymond & George

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners Congrats to – Adam & Norm

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION. Congrats to – Sanford

Related posts:

1. Congrats to our schwag winners
2. The January schwag winners are…
3. Congrats To Our March Schwag Winners!

GORILLA GLUE PRIZE PACK – 5 Winners Congrats to – Ricky Hackett, Rob Camper, Rob McEwen, Joe Wiener, Vincent Gentile

HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners Congrats to – Josh & Adrian

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners Jereme Amann-Burns & Lawrence Amell

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION. Congrats to – Jim Van Vleck

Head over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered for the March drawing today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway.

Please take a moment to answer our listener survey for Matt’s Basement Workshop Podcast. A few simple, anonymous questions with a chance to win a MBW T-shirt if you choose to leave your email. Your answers are private and will never be sold to spammers or advertisers.

Related posts:

1. February Schwag Winners
2. Congrats to our schwag winners
3. The January schwag winners are…

As before, these are straight-forward questions to get a better picture of you and your household. There are no questions or requests for personal information that requires you to submit any kind of identifier about your name, your home address, credit card or bank numbers or even your email address.

The survey is completely anonymous, except if you choose to enter your email address in the final field to get signed up for a chance to win a Matt’s Basement Workshop t-shirt. But even then, that’s not a required field. It’s just a thanks on my part to one lucky survey taker for participating. To get started, click on the link below and please be honest with each question.

The vast majority of the funding for Matt’s Basement Workshop comes from our advertisers and sponsors you see on the website. While it’s currently enough to help cover our annual expenses for hosting services and schwag postage, it falls short of being able to cover equipment and computer upgrades that are inevitable in the future.

Thanks in advance for your participation.

Related posts:

1. Get woodworking week 2012

I’ve been using Gorilla Glue’s PVA glue since late 2010 and I couldn’t be happier. And while I don’t use polyurethane glue all that often, with the recent introduction of the new and improved cap for Gorilla Glue’s version I don’t have to worry about whether I’ll be able to get the cap off the next time I do use it.

So check out the schwag list below this month, sign-up and start all those good luck rituals. Hopefully at the end of February you’ll see your name listed as one of our lucky winners.

GORILLA GLUE PRIZE PACK – 5 Winners	HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners
MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners	ZEM HEARING PROTECTION.

Head over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway.

Related posts:

1. Mid-week tool sneak peek no. 19
2. May Schwag Drawing Sneak Peek
3. February Schwag Sneak Peek

Could there be two more polar opposites? Just imagine all the content they cover in between!

For more information visit their new website at www.thehighlandwoodworker.com.

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1. The Highland Turner Newsletter – A New Resource for Woodturner’s
2. Winter Festival at Highland Woodworking?
3. Highland Woodworking & Matt’s Basement Workshop Together Still

This is the week the online woodworking community comes together to help inspire and teach aspiring woodworkers how to get started building their own projects. Over the last six years of podcasting I’ve heard from plenty of visitors to my show who all say they want to get started in woodworking, but just don’t know where or how. It’s plain and simple, you just start.

There’s a lot of misconceptions about what it takes to build a project, just about all of them center around tools. The fact is, you DON’T need every tool ever made to make your first project. Some of the most reknown woodworkers I know have started their professional careers with only a couple of tools.

Even today, these same woodworkers will talk about the fact there’s tools we assume you HAVE TO HAVE, that they wish they had in their current shops. Woodworking has nothing to do with owning the most expensive tools, what it does have to do with is just using the tools you have available.

To get yourself started visit with a woodworking guild in your area, or take a class at a woodworking supply store like Woodcraft. Check your local colleges and schools. A simple Google search will help you find one in your area. And of course checkout all the content being produced daily by the online woodworking community. We’re here to help you take the first step.

For more information on “Get Woodworking Week” including a ton of links to other bloggers and podcasters participating in this year’s event, visit its brainchild Mr. Tom Iovino’s website www.tomsworkbench.com.

And of course, don’t forget you can find all sorts of project videos, techniques and tool reviews here at Matt’s Basement Workshop too. Just take the plunge!

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HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners each month! Congrats to – Doug Massey & Jacob Deis

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners this month! Congrats to – Michael Davis & Kevin Kronewitter

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION. Congrats to – Michael Borg

Remember, if you weren’t one of the schwag drawing’s lucky winners I’m already starting to take names for the February drawing right now. All the entries have been thrown out and we’re starting fresh. So head on over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway.

Related posts:

1. Congrats to our schwag winners
2. December 2011 Schwag Winners
3. February Schwag Winners

The other day I was perusing the list of shows and noticed one I hadn’t seen before. I’m sure it was there all along, I just hadn’t searched for anything new to me in a long time. I’m so glad I decided to take a look!

Over the years I’ve had a few questions come in from listeners about various marine topics. Nothing as major as “how to make a boat” but a number of questions regarding marine grade lumber or finishes. I’ve always had to claim ignorance, but tried to help point them in the right direction so they could find someone who might have a better idea.

Well now I know exactly who to point these people too, Andy Miller of the Boatworks Today podcast. Andy is just the kind of guy you want on your side when it comes to building or restoring all things nautical and even all around woodworking for that matter.

Andy’s introductory video is posted below (I embedded it with his permission from his website). The videos are full of great information and so far have covered more than just boat restoration. In fact, one of my favorite build series so far has been the Xylophone he built for his daughter for Christmas. Although, the Pizza Paddle has definitely made an impression on me…probably more to do with the ending of the video and the calzone it carried to and from the oven…

Don’t just take my word for it, checkout Andy’s introductory video below and then do yourself a favor and head over to iTunes and subscribe today to download the rest of his videos. By subscribing you’re guaranteed not to miss another episode. Of course you could just head over to his website at www.boatworkstoday.com and learn more about Andy and the show.

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1. 258 – Book Review of “Choosing and Using Hand Tools” by Andy Rae
2. A New Year Starts Today!!

New episodes are just around the corner, but in the mean time I invite you to subscribe to my other show Spoken Wood Podcast if you haven’t done so already.  If you’re not familiar with it, check it out at www.spokenwoodpodcast.com or just click on the “Spoken Wood Podcast” tab on my homepage.

While I’m asking you to checkout Spoken Wood maybe now would be a good time to ask you to consider leaving a rating or comment about any of my podcast feeds over at iTunes?

It’s been a long time since we’ve been ranked in the top shows in our category and therefore a little out of sight of people who have yet to discover the show.  You don’t have to give me a five star rating, but just about any rating will help to draw some attention to the show.  And more attention means I’ll feel the pressure to more and better content!

On a completely different note, but about discovering great woodworking content and feedback.  Have you seen the new semester of Shannon Roger’s Hand Tool School is about to get underway?  Now is  a good time to get signed up so you don’t miss a single lesson.  Visit the school’s website and get signed up today.

Related posts:

1. January Schwag Winners
2. More Listener Email – January 2008
3. 407 January Schwag Giveaway

Of course the one obvious problem with a furnace in the middle of your shop is making sure you have adequate dust collection on your tools. Since the tool budget here at Matt’s Basement Workshop is almost nil (let’s get serious, if it wasn’t for Highland Woodworking’s sponsorship I’d probably still be using a steak knife to cut my lumber) rather than stealing tools to show you what’s new and exciting I’m just going to borrow footage from my friends over at ToolSelect.com.

Recently the guys posted a review of the Jet – 708626CK DC-1100CK 1-1/2-Horsepower 1100 CFM Canister Dust Collector. With it’s powerful suction and ease of bag removal for throwing away dust and chips, it’s just the kind of tool you want around to help keep the air clean…in the shop and out.

For more great reviews (and I plan to cross post more of these) visit www.ToolSelect.com today.

Related posts:

1. Shop Vacs for Dust Collection Systems?
2. My Toolselect.com debut
3. A Few More Thoughts on Shop Vacs

HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners each month! Congrats to – George Keeney & Larry (no last name given)

MICRO JIG ZEROPLAY MITER GUIDE BAR – 2 Winners this month Congrats to – Dennis Rozak & Chris Fox

ToolSelect.com Tool Bag – 2 Winners Congrats to – Jim Ferrell & George Brown

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners this month! Congrats to – Rob Johnston & Christopher Chaffee

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION – 2 Winners this month. Congrats to – Jesse Toland & Mike Thorstenson

Remember, if you weren’t one of the schwag drawing’s lucky winners I’m already starting to take names for the January drawing right now. All the entries have been thrown out and we’re starting fresh. So head on over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway.

Related posts:

1. Congrats to our schwag winners
2. And the April Schwag Winners are…
3. 403 December Schwag Giveaways

Speaking of people getting what they wanted, the holiday weekend interrupted our weekly www.Toolselect.com Tool Bag drawing. So rather than pretending like it never existed, I’ve drawn last week’s winner this morning.

REMEMBER! We’re giving away one bag a week throughout December and another as part of the regular schwag giveaway.

 So if you’re not entered this month, just fill out the schwag entry form by visiting our “Schwag Giveaway Page”.

Did you get gift certificates this year? Use our links to get what you wanted while helping the show.

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1. Weekly Toolbag Giveaway with ToolSelect.com
2. Weekly Toolbag Giveaway with ToolSelect.com
3. 407 January Schwag Giveaway

ONLINE EDUCATION

Use code stretchypants get 10% off

Woodworking App from iTunes AppStore

eBooks from iTunes iBookStore

Related posts:

1. Father’s Day Gift Ideas
2. Holiday Gift links
3. Guest Post – Marking Gauge Gift Guide by Mitch Roberson

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1. Weekly Toolbag Giveaway with ToolSelect.com
2. New WEEKLY Giveaway with BORA Wide Track Clamps
3. Tool Bag Winner This Week is…

Many of you have expressed your dislike for the advertising that plays before the videos start, but the time has come again to turn them back on. Why?

Unfortunately there’s a number of reasons. But the one that’s finally propelled me to make this decision was some nudging from our hosting service. In a nutshell here’s some background information for you.

Matt’s Basement Workshop will have been around for 6 years at the end of January, 2012. In those 6 years we posted quite a few episodes, many of which are videos.

While I don’t deal in millions of downloads, the several thousand monthly downloads would require a dedicated server and bandwidth which I don’t know how I could pay for.

We have advertisers and sponsors, but that income pretty much pays for postage, occasionally hosing fees for the website and a latte or two. Definitely not enough for me to quit my day job, let alone have my own IT department.

Since year one, all of my videos have been hosted at Blip.tv. It’s a great service for a number of reasons, no. 1 they’re free and no. 2 they’re embeddable video player is one of the easiest to use.

Blip.tv does offer a pro service that’s relatively inexpensive and in return content producers get a few extra perks. I signed up for it years ago because the perks were nice but I also wanted to help support them so I could keep hosting my content there.

Given the pro account costs $8/month and hasn’t increased in all this time it only made sense their business model would eventually include advertising to help pay the bills. The advertising has always been an option content producers can opt out of, but for those who do say yes, it’s typically a 50/50 split of the ad revenue.

I tried it before, you hated it, I removed it (actually I hated it too, they can be very disruptive and usually have nothing to do with woodworking) and quite honestly the amount of money I was receiving wasn’t worth the hassle.

But recently I had a conversation with the hosting service and after some consideration it only makes sense that in order to continue providing free videos for my audience I might need to turn the ads back on so they can afford to continue making improvements on their end.

I hope you can understand this isn’t an easy decision to make. I’ve had advertising offers before for services and items that have nothing to do with woodworking, and as tempting as they were, I didn’t want to burden ourselves with things that aren’t woodworking.

I can say for those of you who really hate the idea of sitting through these ad spots to watch the video. The easiest way to avoid them is to download the episodes to your computer. Downloaded videos, either directly from the website or through a subscription somewhere like iTunes, don’t have the ads that will be playing in the embedded video player.

It costs nothing to subscribe, and they’re available to you as soon as they’re released. If you don’t know how to subscribe or want more information, just email me and I’ll be glad to help.

If there is one upside to this, the small revenue from the ad spots not only pays for the hosting service, but it could also help to pay for a new camera that I’ve been meaning to ask you about helping me to raise money for.

But I’ll save that talk for the beginning of 2012…

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2. 380 Back to WIA

I mentioned how Toolselect.com gives reviewers a tool to take back to their shop or job site or wherever they’ll use it and then have the reviewer not just play with the tool and memorize the manual, but instead have the reviewer really USE the tool in day to day applications.

Once they’re done, they come back in to the studio and share their results.

In that post I also mentioned I would eventually be appearing in an upcoming segment to review a tool I had the chance of putting through the paces.

Well, the time has come, here’s that video. It was a great experience and I hope the review can help someone else with their decision if they’re looking for a similar tool to purchase.

Who know’s? You may see me on the set again sometime!

Visit Toolselect.com and decide for yourself, or don’t…it’s up to you.

Related posts:

1. Weekly Toolbag Giveaway with ToolSelect.com
2. Tool reviews and so much more
3. Tool Bag Winner This Week is…

We still have 4 more bags to giveaway this month thanks to the folks at www.Toolselect.com. One bag per week and another as part of the regular schwag giveaway.

 To get entered for the drawing, just fill out the schwag entry form by visiting our “Schwag Giveaway Page”. Weekly winners will be announced Saturday mornings.

Good luck to all of you!

Related posts:

1. Weekly Toolbag Giveaway with ToolSelect.com
2. Another week, another winner!
3. Schwag drawing this week!

I plan to draw the names from the schwag entries each Saturday morning this week by 7am Eastern, so if you haven’t done so get over to my website and get your name entered this month.

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1. New WEEKLY Giveaway with BORA Wide Track Clamps
2. BORA 24″ Clamp Edge Giveaway
3. 407 January Schwag Giveaway

To one degree or another I’ve done this, but I’ve never been able to do it consistently enough to make it worth the while of tool manufacturers to send me items to review, and as a result it’s not something you the audience could count on to appear regularly.

And let’s be honest! Regardless of WHO is doing the tool review or WHERE the tool review is coming from, there will always be a degree of skepticism about how honest the comments are from the reviewer.

Even when the tool is purchased outright or, as often is the case with this show, swapped for an equal amount of advertising (sometimes they get a better deal than I do) the skepticism remains.

As far as I’ve been concerned with most tool reviews either in print, television or on the web. When it’s the same personalities presenting their opinions each time, at some point I become complacent and stop questioning how their experiences might differ from my own.

It’s not their fault, it’s just my natural tendency to wonder whether they’re really truly presenting facts about the tools in real world applications or just parroting the specs and peppering it with previous results from similar equipment in the past.

By this point you’re probably wondering “What does this have to do with anything?” I don’t know? I’m just expressing my own opinion about tool reviews. Which to me is a great segue to introduce a new web destination for people, like me, who want to learn about new tools but don’t want the same old voices and opinions who write them every time.

Recently I had the chance to work with a new company that in my opinion is making great strides to change the way tool reviews SHOULD be handled from this point out.

Toolselect.com is still in the early days of what I hope will be a long life on the web.

The premise of the site is really simple. They don’t tell you what THEY THINK about a particular tool instead they seek out individuals who have some sort of experience with the tool in real world applications. Then they put the tool in their hands to use on a project and at a later date come back into the studio to tell how it went. No sugar coating, no expectations, nothing but facts about what works and what doesn’t.

Toolselect.com doesn’t sell the tools they review, there’s no stockpile in a warehouse somewhere, they receive them from the manufacturer and turn them over to the reviewer. When the reviewer returns to talk about their experience; whether they like it, love it or absolutely loathe it the tool leaves with them.

No strings attached. The reviewer could walk out the door and leave it sitting on the sidewalk if they felt the desire to do so. And that’s where the appeal of this new web destination comes in for me.

Don’t take my word for it, check them out for yourself. Visit Toolselect.com, watch their HD videos on the Toolselect TV webpage or on their YouTube Channel. Browse and compare tools by category or application, or even join their community to talk with all sorts of tool users. There’s so much to checkout on the site that I haven’t made my way through it all yet.

Just so there’s no doubt in anyone’s mind about MY review of Toolselect.com you should know that I met the guys who run the site through a mutual friend. They gave me a tour of the studio, and then, so I could experience the whole review process myself they had me try a couple of tools (actually I expressed interest in the tools before they could even say anything about trying them).

As of when this is being posted, I just finished going into their studio the other night to film my own tool reviews and was blown away by the professionalism of the entire experience. For the record, I really struggled with one of the tools NOT to find a way to justify why someone should consider buying it even though I really didn’t like it.

But as we went through the review, Barnaby (the host of Toolselect TV) didn’t lead me one way or the other for an opinion only facts on the features and what happened when I used it. In the end I felt like I gave an honest review based on facts, not opinions.

I plan to post those reviews here when they come out, and don’t be surprised to see more reviews from Toolselect.com being cross-posted here in the future. They’re receiving more tools specific to woodworking and that’s a great reason to share them with you.

Visit Toolselect.com and decide for yourself, or don’t…it’s up to you.

Related posts:

1. 291 DVD Review – Hand Tool Techniques Pt.3

HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners each month! Congrats to – Ed Drachenberg & Eric Beckham

MICRO JIG ZEROPLAY MITER GUIDE BAR Congrats to – M. Haley

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners this month! Congrats to – Tom Moores & Ralph Houser

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION Congrats to – Texas Ted

Remember, if you weren’t one of the schwag drawing’s lucky winners I’m already starting to take names for the December drawing right now. All the entries have been thrown out and we’re starting fresh. So head on over to the Schwag sign up page to get yourself entered today mattsbasementworkshop.com/giveaway.

Related posts:

1. Congrats To Our March Schwag Winners!
2. February Schwag Winners
3. Schwag drawing this week!

It’s been a while since our last drawing, so we need to work the kinks out of the system. But here goes nothing.

Visit the Schwag signup page between now and midnight of Tuesday (Eastern Time Zone). Click on the SCHWAG button at the top of the homepage at www.mattsbasementworkshop.com or go directly to the SCHWAG page by CLICKING HERE
. Fill out the submission form and consider yourself all set for the drawing on Wednesday morning.

That’s all there is to it. Nothing could be easier. Once the winners’ names are drawn, the list will be wiped clean and the submission process starts all over for the December drawing.

What do you have a chance to win this month? How about the following?

HIGHLAND WOODWORKING WOODSLICER BLADE – 2 Winners each month!

MILESCRAFT Drill90 – 2 Winners this month!

ZEM HEARING PROTECTION

More Schwag items are likely to be added soon, so I wish all of you luck! Hopefully you’ll be hearing from me with a “CONGRATS” in the email subject line.

Related posts:

1. Schwag Drawing This Week!
2. March Schwag Drawing This Week!
3. May Schwag Drawing Sneak Peek