I ended up with so many pencils extended that I am able to
give away a baker's dozen as a gift, and still have plenty
left over for my classroom.
I worked out a way to use the papers "wires" I have been
working on to make holders for the pencils. It was an
interesting sculpting project. . . I think the first one
turned out better than the second, which always a bit of a
let-down, so I will keep the second one I made, as I much
more pencil rich than the other teacher, so this is just me
storing my surplus, trophy style.
Another kind of holder I made is an organizer for my
classroom's color pencils. I made a series of tiny boxes
out of cardboard and glued them down to a thin bit of scrap
board and then the sides to each other to both add strength
and compensate for imperfections in how I cut the sides.
Another method of strengthening was to cut little strips of
cardboard that I formed into Ls by folding on a grain line
and gluing it on the inside of the box, joining the sides
together. I found that clothes pins worked as nice, little
clamps for that purpose.
Before I glued the boxes, I made u-shaped handles out of
plywood using my scroll-saw, the real work horse of my odd,
little shop.
As you can imagine, all of these pieces looked very mis-
matched, and the cardboard looked down-right junk punk,
which is not the look I try to go for in a classroom
setting, so paint became the solution. I really dislike
painting as an operation, at least for three-dimensional
pieces, but what must be done. . . must be done.
I put the first coat on tonight and will do the next coat
tomorrow.
==
I love to hear from people. My email is the handle minus
"net" (so, a work by Voltaire that starts with "c"), at
sdf.org.
While we're adding boiler plate: this work is hereby in the
public domain. Do what you want with it.