First post, first knife!

So this is my first post and also my first knife.
At the moment its getting heat-treated at Gatherwood (see links), but here comes the story from design ti'll here!
I've started out because i wanted a knife for heavy outdoor uses, but all the ones i saw were either not to my liking, or simply to expensive.
So only one thing left, DIY!
I started out with making a sketch of the knife.

It was still quite crude, and the final result was somewhat different.
I bought a starter-kit from Gatherwood, it contained a book on knifemaking and a piece of RWL 34 steel. The book really helped me getting started and prevented me from making some nice screw-ups. I started out with making a cardboard template which i trimmed to my liking and then drew the outline on the steel.

And then the real work starts!! Cutting an filing it into shape. This method of knife-amking is called "stock-removal". After quite some sawing and filing, the shape was there.

Then the biggest part of making the knife begins, sanding.
After all the filing, plan about 4 times the filing time for the sanding!
And don't forget to drill the holes for the scales and weight reduction of the handle :-p

And then off to get the HT!!!!
Expect more next week!