: I helped my freind bruce with the pattern of dots in Nick's book...we cut
: blocks of pine and turned them round on a metal lathe and fitted them into
: drilled holes in some blocks. the rounded pine had the grain going accross
: the cylinder rather than along it as in a dowel. once inserted and glued
: into the larger blocks, they were sliced like balongne 1/4 inch thick. the
: slices were then worked into the pattern strip.

Hi Eric, I've got a similar plan. Unfortunately I don't have a lathe I'm going to round it down with a block plane - like I did with my paddle and then run it through one of these pencil sharpener tools; I have the one in the top right corner of this picture. I'm not sure how it will do on the Spruce end grain but... I'll find out. I have two styles of plug cutter that I might try too.

A lathe sounds like a lot more fun.