How Long?

Completed Work

Perhaps the question I get asked most often is, “How long did it take you?” Although I’ve always tried to give an honest answer, the reality is I’ve never really known. For a long time, I estimated each piece averaged between 100 to 120 actual working hours. But there wasn’t any data in that estimate.

Despite beginning every new project with a deliberate intention to capture working hours, I never found the discipline to do so. The best I could usually do was estimate the number of days from start to finish, and even that was along the lines of… “Let’s see. I started it a couple of days before Valentine’s Day and finished just after Julie’s birthday. So, that’s about 50 days.” But all my work is done outside so I don’t work in the rain or snow. And when the temperature drops into the mid-forties, my hands get too cold to work the tools. Likewise, I can only work for short periods when the Oklahoma sun turns the broiler up to high. And I do take days off and procrastinate at times. So just knowing the elapsed number of days doesn’t help much.

Determined to get a better estimate, I committed to sending my daughter a progress photo at the end of each working day. So, as I began working on “Sgili”, I dutifully sent her a pic each day, captioning it with Day 1, Day 2, etc. As the weeks went on and my work progressed, my unaccustomed discipline waned and I started missing days. But I would eventually remember and could then determine with fair certainty which days I had worked so pics jumped from Day 23 to Day 27 (or whatever). As I complete the project today, I am confident that my estimate in the number of working days is accurate to +/-3 days. I am satisfied with that since I know myself well enough to know that is likely as close as I will ever get.

I began carving “Sgili” on May 1st and finished on July 28th. That gives an elapsed time of 88 days which, at first glance, seems like an incredibly long time to me. But how many of those days did I not work? The weather through this period was not helpful. We slogged through the wettest June ever recorded in Oklahoma. And when the rains finally stopped, the summer heat and humidity settled over like a hot, wet blanket. Still, my photo log shows I worked 50 days out of the 88 (57%). I actually feel pretty good about that. I also feel it’s accurate enough to allow me to estimate actual working hours.

My average carving session is about four hours. It varies wildly, not only due to weather, but also due to appointments, chores that must be done during the same optimal time of the day, time spent with my wife and family, and of course my aforementioned tendency to procrastinate. On the flip side, I will sometimes work a second session in the afternoon, when my workspace is bathed in shadow from the trees stretching up alongside. In the cooler months, I will work a second session most days, at times even working through the entire day with just a few short breaks. But, during this project, I was rarely able to do more than a single session in the morning. All said and done, I feel like an average of four hours for each working day is accurate enough and, again, as accurate as I will likely ever get.

So the answer for this particular project is 200 +/-12 hours. This estimate feels right and, more importantly, it makes me realize how many hours I am fortunate enough to get to spend doing the thing I love most. And just this moment I realize this will be the subject of my next post.

Until next time, thanks for sharing my journey!

Early Work in Progress Pictures.