Starting with www.toolemera.com, The Village Carpenter, and Matt's Basement Workshop among others, I have been slowly adding new blogs to the aggregator on this site.

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I’d like to invite you to a brief tour of Brezno – nice small town in the heart of Slovakia where I’m living now.

Let’s see what Wikipedia has to say about Brezno’s history:

“The place has been inhabited since prehistoric times, but the current town arose from an old Slovak settlement, next to which newly arrived German miners erected a typical square market in the early 13th century. The first written evidence of the town’s existence is dated 1265 when King Béla IV of Hungary issued a charter for the hunters from the area of Liptov allowing them to use woods around the settlement, known as Berezuno. The name is derived from the Slovak word “breza” for birch. In the nineteenth century Brezno was a typical almost purely Slovak town and was one of the centres of the Slovak national movement. Since Second World War it has developed into an industrial town.”

“According to the 2001 census, the town had 22,875 inhabitants.”

... and this is interesting info too: “Brezno is twinned with the French town of Meudon, Nový Bydžov in the Czech Republic and Ciechanów in Poland.”

Tour continues with some beautiful photos. Enjoy…

History

From the sky

Courthouse

Town square

Panorama

Storm

Gray Bear golf course near Brezno

Low Tatras in winter

Wikipedia's page about Brezno
Nice article at Spectacular Slovakia
Beautiful photos of the region at Hiking.sk
Map of the Upper Hron River Region

Thanks to jeanmarc for posting his region tour today. He inspired me ;)

Hope you enjoyed!

I just cannot imagine my two nephews being apart. For example, once when Gail and I were babysitting the twins and their 3 siblings, all 5 kids went down to the basement to watch a movie… slumber party style. I went down there and found 4 sleeping bags. When I asked why there were only 4 sleeping bags, the middle child (Maddy) looked at me like I was an idiot and said, “The twins sleep together.�

Harrison and Jackson recently got a room to themselves, and they got bunk beds. When they gave her a tour of their room, Gail asked them who slept on the top bunk. The reply was, “Nobody…we both sleep on the bottom.� When I think of the twins, I just can’t conceive of having one without the other.

So imagine my surprise when I discovered the story of a different pair of twins who were separated at birth. This story is one of the things I learned when Gail and I travelled to Dublin recently. It’s a lamentable and cruel tale of two twin brothers separated at birth. One was taken to America, and the other was hustled off to Ireland. However, the DNA connection of these two was so strong that even though each never knew of the other, the very chemistry of their makeup carried them down educational roads and career paths that were remarkably similar.

It wasn’t until I happened to go shopping one day in Dublin that I discovered the story of TK and TJ….The MAXX Brothers.

“You know what the funniest thing about Europe is…it’s the little differences.� Vincent Vega, American Philosopher (deceased)

You can sharpen your woodworking skills with helpful tips and techniques from the editors of Woodsmith and ShopNotes magazines. Get a FREE tips sent to your email address each week! Got to Woodworking Tips.com and sign up today.

Here?s last week?s tip from Woodsmith online editor Ted Raife:

Whenever I use screws to assemble a project, I hide them under wood plugs. Cutting the plugs and gluing them in place is the easy part of the job. The bigger challenge comes once the glue dries ? trimming the plugs flush to the surface.

For me, this is a two-step process. First, I use a small back saw to trim off the bulk of the protruding plug. Then I sand or plane the remaining portion flush to the surface. But my lack of care with the back saw often led to problems. If I tried to cut the plug too close, I would scratch or gouge the surface, making more work for myself.

But as is usually the case, a small problem had a simple solution. I dug up a scrap of plastic laminate and made a flush cut shield. The laminate shield has a hole drilled through it slightly larger than the diameter of the plugs. You place the shield over the plug flush to the surface and then saw away without worry (Figure 1). The thin shield allows you to give the plug a very close trim and all that?s needed to finish the job is a little sanding (Figure 2).

For more helpful project tips, techniques, and plans, visit Plansnow.com.

Good Woodworking,

Ted Raife
Online Editor, Woodsmith

If there is one power tool that lends itself perfectly to accessories it?s the table saw. Things like push sticks and stop blocks can make using a table saw more efficient and safe. And, auxiliary fences for the miter gauge and the rip fence prevent chip out and protect the factory fence from being damaged.

Best of all, each of these accessories can easily be made in the shop. This week?s Woodsmith Woodworking Seminar focuses on seven accessories that are ?must-haves.?

You’ll find a few pieces of hardware, that can be used for building jigs, for sale at the Woodsmith Podcast Store, plus a link to the seminar guide.

* Room decoration

* Door frame of the room door

* Main door of the main room or door among other room in the house

John is working on completing the Trestle Table

I used my tax stimulus money to buy a flat screen TV.  The problem is that I have to walk past the TV to get to the shop.  So I was enjoying TV in all it flatness when I saw the end of the table sticking out of the shop.  It seemed to beckon me as it lay there cupped and in need of work.  But, I am a man, so I grabbed the remote and ignored it.  Now I am back at it and dealing with the cup across the width of the table.

The trestle table top (say that three times fast!)  is made from two book matched cherry boards.  They finished out at 103 inches long and 13 inches wide.  I added a middle board to the two book matched pieces to get a final width of 31 inches.  This was going to be a kitchen table but with the length, it goes into the living room.  I could have cut the top?only kidding, I would never cut boards like that.  Would you? 

The thickness of the top is just under ¾ inch so it flattens when forced without that nasty cracking noise that indicates you just learned another lesson.  The cup, which you can see in the picture, is a ¼ inch.  For the picture I clamped on side of the table flat so you can see the total cup that I needed to flatten. 

Now the bread board ends create a cross grain situation and wood movement becomes an issue.  I like wood movement! There I said it.  I like feeling the non flush edges that arrive with the seasons.  My friend has a table from the great Christian Becksvoort and he insisted on bread board ends.  He can feel with his fingers that the top has moved.  I like these oddities and have added divots and ridges under the arms of chairs for a person to finger when sitting.  These subtle aspects humanize a piece. 

First thing to do was to determine the size and layout of the tennons.  Since we have a cross grain situation I am only going to glue the middle tennon,.  I decided on three tennons because it gives me a middle.  I think five tennons would work if the width would accommodate it.  I also used a stub tennon on the entire width of the top.  This stub is 3/8 inch in length.  The thickness of all tennons is a ¼ inch.  A rule of thumb in deciding the widths of the tennons is the have all of them equal ½ the total width of the table.  For me, I made them 5 inches for a total tennon width of 15 inches.  It is also important to have enough wood at the ends of the bread boards so I started the tennons ¾ inch in from the edge.  I marked the mortis locations from the tennons.  I increased the mortis for the end tennons by 1/8 inch on each side to allow for movement.

Warning!!  The video was all shot with the old camera!!

The new workbench top is in place and it not only looks great but it works great too.

A nice flat surface, easy to attach accessories and jigs and of course when it gets to messed up...off with the old and on with the new.

Thanks for all the feedback so far, keep it a coming!

WIN AN iPOD TOUCH!!  If you have the time, please take the new listener survey, and when you do you'll be entered to win an iPod Touch.

If you'd like to enter for free schwag or just have a comment, question or suggestion drop me a line at mattsbasementworkshop@gmail.com or  head over to my website at www.mattsbasementworkshop.com or call our Skype Voicemail at 231 354-2338.

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