Brett Peterson in Puyallup

[petersb]

Well I copied this from the last forum and thought that I would post it here since the forum moved just a few days after I joined! Here it is again.

I am Brett Peterson and I live in Puyallup, WA. I started into woodworking about 10 years ago when I recieved a $50 Home Depot gift card from my foreman, at work, for Christmas. I hadn't had much experience with woodworking before that other than a 7th grade woodshop class. I decided to add another $50 of my own to the gift card and buy a Ryobi scroll saw with it.

That is really where I started. I built a small pine shelf with some scrollsawn supports for my girls, I painted it purple, of course. I really enjoyed cutting on the scrollsaw and I convinced myself that a finishing sander would be a great "reward" for completing the shelf for the girls. I bought a DeWalt finishing sander and soon after decided that a random orbit sander would take less "effort" to sand and with better results. This is where the pursuit of more tools and bigger projects began. I think that I considered myself a "woodworker" when I completed a set of maple bunkbeds for my two boys. That was somewhere around 7-8 years ago.

Well now I have a shop with a good set of power tools to get pretty much most woodworking projects done. I have been "fixing up" my shop this summer and getting the space dedicated to just woodworking space and some storage. For the past 5 years, I have worked in a tiny "hole" in the back of the garage because most of the space was taken up with "junk" that seemed to keep growing. I was fighting tool surface rust and I was really frustrated with the shop space overall. My Dad made a few suggestions on how to improve the lighting and the area that I had to work and so I started to do just what he suggested. It turned into a much larger project than I had started out on. Now I can say that the shop space is truly a "woodshop" and is dedicated to that.

Now I am able to go out into the shop and find a tool that I need and actually have the space to use it!

I would pretty much consider now, (July/August 2010) the time to start thinking about woodworking with a bit more of a purpose in mind and to try and expand my skills and spend more time in the shop. I don't have any goals to become a paid professional but, a serious hobbyist. I enjoy making things that will be used and appreciated for generations to come. I hope that one day my great, great, great garndchildren will still be using the things that I build today.

Thanks for reading

Brett Peterson

[rivendale34]

Well, the thread title caught my attention... as I'm from Puyallup myself. I'm no longer there, moved away in '96, and I'm sure it's no longer even close to what I remember.

But your named seemed familiar to me too. Either that, or I'm just even more under the influence of my kids and confused as usual.

Anyways, good to see a fellow Puyallupian(?), hopefully a fellow Ram ('93) and not a Viking... Course I heard there's a third now...

Steve

[petersb]

Well, the thread title caught my attention... as I'm from Puyallup myself. I'm no longer there, moved away in '96, and I'm sure it's no longer even close to what I remember.

But your named seemed familiar to me too. Either that, or I'm just even more under the influence of my kids and confused as usual.

Anyways, good to see a fellow Puyallupian(?), hopefully a fellow Ram ('93) and not a Viking... Course I heard there's a third now...

Steve

Hi Steve,

I have been in the Puyallup area for about 16 years. I was a Charger (Kentridge 90'), not a Ram, sorry. The area has probably grown up a bit since you left, some good, some not so good. It is still a nice area to live in.

If you left in 96, there were about 3 years overlap there so we may have encoutered each other, it's probably just a hometown connection though.

Take Care Steve

Brett