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 Yesterday afternoon I used the last few minutes of the work day to surface plane some boards of maple. Today I start by ripping those boards into strips using the table saw and my monster rip fence. This is a 5 foot long attachment that I built to fit over the regular rip fence when making long rip cuts that need to be very straight.
 As I rip the stock I lay it in position on a side table so I can see when I have enough material to make the two cutting boards that have been ordered. The long strips will get cut off and moved to the top - I just have to kind of eye-ball that to know when to stop cutting strips.
 When I have enough stock cut up I lay the strips out and start shifting them around to get a pleasing pattern of grain, color and strip widths. I like to go for a symmetrical pattern, and if I have one piece that is a bit different in color, run that down the center.
 Next I use clamps to draw the strips tightly together an look for trouble makers - strips that for whatever reason won't draw up tightly. We can allow no gaps. These trouble makers may get shifted in position; if the problem is near the end I can slide it out so the problem will be cut off, or that strip may be trimmed down a hair to remove the problem lump or hollow.
It is important to remember that the templates are the size and shape of the INSIDE of the client's sink - I must leave about an inch of extra wood on all sides of the template so that I can trim it straight and then route a ¾" lip that will sit on the rim of the sink. Making this template is covered in our Template Tutorial page.
 When I've got it the way I want it, I clamp the group of strips to a miter gauge and cut the group to rough length. This gives me a much smoother edge on one end and is much quicker than cutting each strip to length individually.
Before removing the clamps I draw a large "V" across all the strips with a pencil. This will help me keep the strips in the right order and orientation as I move them about (like in case I drop the whole kit and kaboodle) and as I glue them up. But that is the next step.
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