Flower bowl

 I was given this pice of wood by my friend at work who is building a new house on Kent Island (yes she works way up here and lives on Kent Island...I don't get it either) and I ask her to bring some chunks of wood up with her.    This is the only log that looked like this.  I am not sure if this is locust but it has an interesting profile.  It has been sitting in the garage all winter because I did not know what to do with it.   Normally I would cut a log through the center and put the 1/2 (or less) log on so that I see the bark like the top left picture.  I couldn't decide to do that or to a natural edge with all that interest going on but that would be endgrain turning which is harder and something in don't do much.  It also involves the pith which tends to crack.  In a bowl like this.  I know it adds character and that is what many of my bowls end up with but this would have a great amount of character without extra character. My usual style is to have an idea what I am going to make but no clear plan.  I will plan to use the most of the wood, most likely a bowl and whatever shape comes out from the shape of the wood, my turning mistakes, or "character" that turns up in the wood.  I turned the back round and a tenon on it.  Turned it around and started hollowing out the inside. Then I thinned it out and made it deeper.   I got to a point where I liked the shape and I sanded it pretty aggressively to get rid of the tool marks.  If I saw a crack I would super glue it to stop the spreading.  When I got most of the sanding done I put some salad bowl finish on to seal it to pull out the areas that I needed to sand some more.  Then I made my semi-fatal flaw.  I parted off the bowl from the base and left a most of the base here at the bottom of the bowl on the bowl.... solid.    Now one of the well know ways to try and prevent bowls from cracking is to make them all the same thickness.  So when you make thin "leaves" on the bowl and make the base 2-3 inches thick ... solid ... it can't be good.  There are the cracks starting on the bottom..... Then notice the nice "character" with the nice crack in the bowl. 

 Photos of the finished bowl.  I put several coats of salad bowl finish on it and took it to the meeting @MCW and got some great comments but no real ideas of what wood it is.

I was lucky enough to get a picture of the bowl in it's final (for now) resting place.  It looks like a place of honor and I am very pleased, thanks sweetie ;).