Wrapped up an assignment yesterday, and will wrap another tomorrow, then another by week’s end, then: free time in the shop! But wait, I have nothing to do.

For the first time in years the harmonies have converged to give me a full week of shop time before Christmas. But also for the first time in years, I’m not scrambling to finish up a Christmas gift project in my woodshop. Not sure how that happened.

We do plan on gifting a few folks with some nice items I’ve made, but those projects were finished some time ago. And with a full week of available shop time before Christmas, I have no shop requests, no person on our Christmas list who’s not covered.

I have a week of no assignment deadlines, all other deadlines met, not a single item on my to-do list, and a clean and empty shop.

So, what to do? What to do?

Dare I do something shop-wise that I rarely do? Something that it’s been so long since the last time, that I can’t immediately remember when that was? In other words, should I dare give myself a Christmas gift, and head out into the shop to make something for the pure joy of it?

Yeah, I think so.

A.J.