I had an old (~12 years) piece of figured maple that I had bought a long time ago from a hardwood supplier in western Iowa. I never had gotten around to using it and it was taking room up in my garage. I had read that any instrument (tone) wood should be aged at least 6 years. Well, I decided this year to make wood percussion blocks as a present for the nephews and nieces. My secret goal is to actually give them something that is very loud for the kids to play with which will annoy my siblings later on when I am not around in the months (and hopefully years) to come. In previous years, I made other noisemakers and xylophones and so on but, I think this turned out the best so far - - visually as well as how they actually sounded. I really believe this in large part is due to the age of the wood I used. I made a few different sizes, but the larger ones seem to have a more full and traditional knock to their sound. This video documents how I made them.