This 16 inch pine plaque took about 3 hours to paint. I was very nervous trying to tackle this project.

Shawn’s dad asked bought the letter “D-E-E-R-I-N-G B-A-N-J-O” from the states and wanted to make something similar to the Deering Banjo logo. So the photo he sent me had yellow letters with black outline, so me and Shawn painted those letters and he had sealed with with varathan (like 60 coats of varnish… you can eat off of it)

Then the hard part. I attempted wood burning on a small sample pine wood… the impact of the eagle eyes were NOT there, I used oil color and water color pencil crayons (when adding water it appears to look like paint), it did NOT look good either. Then one day i sat down and decided to just do it. I just used acrylic paints, I sketched out the silhouette of the eagle and started to mix white, black, orange, yellow and brown colors on my palette.

I started out painted the beak. Yellow, brown and dark brown. It looks OK-ay to me. Then I added some texture around the beak by dotting some yellow and greys. I used my medium sized brush loaded with white paint and a dash of grey and started to add strokes to the feathers.

Then I painted the dark brown feathers with one shade as i didn’t want to take away from the white feathers. I used a thing “0″ (zero) brush and used dark dark brown and light brown 1 inch strokes to look like feather.

3 hours later I am done. I am pretty happy with the outcome. This is only 1 part of 3, so more to come shortly.

I used my Walnut hollow woodburning tool  #5594 shading tool tip for the ivy leaves (as i call them) and just a calligraphy point for the branches in between. That didn’t take long…

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I found this tin box way above on my moms shelf. She keeps lose receipts and stuff in there. I really liked it.  I looked at the bottom, it WAS a tin for lady fingers (yum) which i probably ate … a long time ago.

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I put my peacock marble piece on my facebook page and an old friend from high school sent me a message. They needed 3 wooden plaques engraved for their 3 horses, Oreo, Chanel and Charlie. I have never done this before….

We met the day after, and they dropped off the wooden plaques at my house. Boy was i excited to start this. I went to Micheals craft store and bought a wood burning kit ($40) and after my physio appointment i started working on it.

I started with Charlie’s plaque first. I choose a ‘script’ writing, It was fun, my first try turned out quite well. Took about 3 hours for this one, I had to keep waiting for the wood burning ‘pen’ to heat up to the highest temperature to get the DARK burnt look.

The next day i worked on Oreo. Shawn told me it should be like an oreo cookie. I didn’t take that suggestion too seriously, but i was searching online for fonts and ideas for this one, and THIS ONE CAME UP. Does it not look similar to the Oreo font? a bit more ornate but still.

Two days after i worked on Chanel’s lovely plaque. Chanel is a beautiful black and white horse. She is the princess of the three horses. Believe me i have a wonderful photo of her I wanted her plaque to be more girly and cutesy.

I found this Gothic font and added the frills as i wished. I used a burning stamper to make the markings along the oval edges.

This one is one of my favorite….

I am inspired to make a plaque for the front of my house. Next time i go to Micheal ill pick up another wooden plaque.

Can’t wait. Hope you enjoy my gallery.

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Mom put a watermelon in front of me and said..”i need this carved and completed in 2 days. “

I have never even done something like this before.. how does she expect me to do this? AHHH

So i pulled out my carving kit, i have never used it. My aunt bought it from Taiwan for me when i was a tiny one.

I stared at the watermelon as it quietly stared back. I was defeated. I was scared…

But then a shimmer of hope as i looked at its side. The patterns looks like a flower petal. Then it hit me, i could attempt to carve a flower basket (yes ATTEMPT TO.. is the key word). So here I go, I started with the two edges, two daisy, with big and small leaves a space fillers.

I then worked on the handles of the basket with the jagged edge tool. It turned out quite well.

Mom showed the carving to her students, they were inspired and made beautiful creations themselves. Its great being able to inspire kids. I do enjoy it

I loved this little project. It was a new experience for me. It was very difficult and took two full hours. I can’t say i would try this again because it was exhausting, but the outcome is awesome.

It just shows you… you can do anything you try. (i know that sounds lame)
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