We're back from Woodworking in America 2014! Although we spent most of our time in the Benton convention center, we thoroughly enjoyed a few of the charming aspects of Winston-Salem, NC. Here on the Northern California coast we do not get many chances to eat out-of-doors in the evenings as the fog often rolls in as the sun goes down. Linda and I had a great dinner sitting in the warm, balmy evening air at the sidewalk tables of the Honey Pot.

But, being with old and new friends at WIA was the best thing of all! We saw fellow toolmakers, woodworkers, bloggers, the gang from Popular Woodworking - a blur of old and new friends. It was a lot of fun and very rewarding. Most exciting were the new, up-and-coming accessory- and tool-makers at this year's WIA. We met for the first time planemaker  Caleb James, Chris Kuehn at Sterling Tool Works , Claire Minihan who makes beautiful travishers, Jason Thigpen from Texas Heritage Woodworks, Norm Reid and Jeff Fleisher from Shenandoah Toolworks, and Alan Walke and Aaron Moore of Walke Moore Tools . Most of these toolmakers are young toolmakers - new to The Proud & Unplugged - and I couldn't recommend a more talented group.

Linda has featured this year's photograph of The Proud & Unplugged, woodworking's independent handtool makers, in this issue of our newsletter, Sharp & to the Point. Thank you David Picciuto, woodworking maven at Drunken Woodworker, for being such a nice guy and taking this historic photograph.

After the conference, we went off to Asheville for a couple of days where we spent time with Owen Edwards and Russel Gale both woodworkers who moved from our neck of the woods to the woods around Asheville, and our good friend Jack Bogdanovich, of  JSB Guitars, On top of that, we had a terrific time visiting with planemaker Scott Meek, his wife Lori and their two adorable children, Ivy and Anderson.

We also brought some rainy/balmy North Carolina weather back with us; it began to rain as soon as we drove into Fort Bragg. No real drought relief but everything's fresher and cleaner for the half-inch "storm".

That's all for now - got to get back to work and, of course, if there's anything you need form Hock Tools, please let me know.