Toy Competition,

Last year during my Habitat for Humanity build, my good friend Joe and I were sitting outside having a glass of wine (I drank the wine) and smoking a cigar (Joe smoked the cigar) talking about wood working projects we had done through the years, Joe comes up with the idea that we should have a toy building competition.  I like a good challenge so we set some rules. There was only 4 rules (1) had to be a toy, (2) had to have a mechanical moving part that worked, (3) project needed to be good enough for display and (4) We had one year to complete our projects.

Neither one of use knew what the other was building; it was to be a surprise.  We agreed to have the Habitat for Humanity folks vote on the best toy.

We took our projects to the Habitat site and had over 20 people review our projects.  Everybody agreed that the two projects were not in the same category. 

Joe’s project did not meet all of the agreed to rules (no mechanical moving part that worked, was not a toy) . He did however build a magnificent replica of the USS Arizona (1/16 scale). He figures he spent over 6 months working on it.

My project was an 18-inch road scraper toy, which met rules 1 through 4.  The road scraper was made out of Walnut and Maple. I spent a total of 52 hours to complete my project.

Joe is going to loan his ship to the VA hospital in Tucson, Arizona for others to enjoy.  I donated my scraper to the Habitat for Humanity for next years “Hammers and High Heels” fundraiser auction, the Habitat Director figures it will bring in $300.00 plus. (update, Sold at action for $410.00)

Throughout the year we both enjoyed providing little clues and teasing each other as to what we were building.