For those who want to create solid friendships and enjoy a new hobby, the Lorain County Woodcarvers’ Club is ready to help you create your own niche in its group.
Members hold open sessions at 7 p.m. on the first and last Wednesdays of each month at the Lucy Idol Center in Vermilion, and another on the third Wednesday of each month at 7 p.m. in the Carriage Barn at Mill Hollow in Vermilion.
“We’ve got people doing all sorts of different carving, depending on what they like to do,” says Bob Lipscomb, the club president. “But, we all like to carve wood. And we talk together about what we’re doing.”
Lipscomb says a friend, Charlene “Charlie” Barbee, got him involved when she took him to a wood-carving course at her church. “The teacher was a master carver from Ford who told all of us that we’d be able to carve a bird by the end of the course,” he says. “I thought it was pretty interesting so I kept doing it, and that was five or six years ago.”
Bob Phelan, who manages the club website, says people come to the open carves and meetings from all over the county.
“You can look at the site and the pictures and activities and see all the different styles,” Phelan says. 
Ron Turton likes to carve a variety of fish. “I’ve been carving for about 20 years now,” he explains. “I didn’t really have an affiliation with any group for awhile, but these are really good people.”
Lipscomb notes that a spirit of caring extends beyond the club’s borders. For example, he says, members work on the Fallen Feathers Project, in which wooden bald eagle feathers are carved with the name of each Ohio soldier who dies in the line of duty in Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation New Dawn.
 Barbee recently completed a feather.
“It meant a lot to be able to do that,” she says. “It’s a project that you know means something to people,” Lipscomb adds.
Turton also utilizes his skills as a volunteer for the Carousel Museum in Sandusky.
Although their carving styles may differ, members of the group maintain a strong bond and fellowship with each other.
“It brings all of us together,” Phelan says.
Club members invite people to check out their website at http://loraincountywoodcarversclub.shutterfly.com.