Easy Homemade Wooden Tea Cup Without a Lath

Hey everyone so here's just a quick instructable about how I made this teacup without using a lathe. All I used was a drill a sand belt and sand paper. Enjoy!
Edit:
Thanks so much for the feature on my first instructable! Have fun trying it out! :)

Step 1: Getting Your Wood

If you look at my finished product you will see that it's got a funky grain to it. This is because it's what's called a burl. I'll let you look it up if you want to know more but they have the cool wood grain patterns. For my cup I cut off a chunk of this recently dead cedar tree in my back yard.

Step 2: Rough Shaping

The next step is to saw off any protrusions and make it as semi circular as possible. I just used a regular saw and a clamp for this step but you can do it how you see fit.

Step 3: Belt Sanding

This next step could probably be skipped depending on how symmetrical you cut your burl, but this definitely makes things easier. All I did was run it against the belt sander to fine tune the shape a bit more.

Step 4: Starting to Look Like a Cup!

Here's where things get makeshift. I don't have a lathe to get the cup shaped perfectly so instead I used a drill. So first I got a screw and cut off the head with a metal saw. Then I clamped down on this screw with my drill as if it were a drill bit. Then I drove the screw into the middle of the cup. From there with a piece of string I drew a perfect circle the size I wanted the cup to be. Then comes the fun part! You then turn the drill on slowly while holding it in one hand to control speed and in the other hand you hold sandpaper up to your cup. Always remember to wear safety glasses and make sure your wood is extremely extremely secure. If you don't, technically the wood could fly off and hurt someone or something! Another good idea would be to use thick sanding belt sand paper so it doesn't burn through and also a must would be to use gloves. Other than that just shape it however you think looks best.

Step 5: Cutting Out the Middle

Ok I'm not gunna lie this is the most time consuming part, but this is the only way I could think of with the tools I had available. First I drilled a bunch of holes into the cup to make cutting out the middle easier. Make sure you don't drill too deeply by taping off the drill bit to the length you want to drill. Then to take out more of the wood I started using a pocket knife and that worked alright, but I ended up borrowing a friends dremel. If you don't have a dremel it's going to take a while and even if you do I would suggest doing a lot of the end work by hand because it's very easy to take too much off with a dremel. But next just use course to fine grit sand paper to get the walls as thin as possible.

Step 6: Fine Grit Sanding

Your almost there all the hard work is done! Next just go over everything with a fine grit sandpaper and get it as smooth as you possibly can with the highest grit paper you have. The pictures I have of this step are of the cup dipped in water so I could see how it might look when finished.

Step 7: Finishing the Cup

There are many finishes that can be used but I chose walnut oil and bees wax for a couple if reasons. Number one being that it creates a waterproof and food safe seal for the wood. I bought them both on eBay for a couple bucks and I use them for all my food safe items. Basically I just use a paper towel to put a layer of walnut oil on the wood and then let it dry overnight. For this cup I put three layers then I smooshed on a layer of beeswax.

Step 8: Done!

Then all that's left to do is put your initials on it and have a cup of tea! Please leave a comment if you enjoyed this instructable or if you have any questions suggestions or just wanna say hey! :) Thanks for looking!