Mouse Santa

This is a carving from a roughout that the carving club did. One of the members purchased a resin casting from the family of a carver in NW Arkansas and made some roughouts for a club project. I don't carve a lot of roughouts, but I like to support the club and had a lot of fun doing this one. It kinda forces me to try some new things that I might not otherwise have chosen as a subject. I changed up the design a bit and decided to add some whiskers, from a horsehair bench brush! Thanks for looking!

Trucker Gnome

I made a “pharmacy” gnome for my daughter to have when she worked at a pharmacy in college. Her friends liked it and one requested a trucker gnome, since he worked for a trucking company. I didn’t think he was serious, but he has mentioned it since then, so this is what I made for him as a gift. I had to think a bit on what might distinguish it as a truck driver and decided he had to have the iconic chrome mud-flap girl, a decorative element on many trucks!. I added the cowboy boots, since he is in Texas, and gave him a dangling cigarette. The recipient was quite excited! Thanks for looking!

"Bon Temps Rouler!"

It's finished!

Here is a link to a video of it dancing!

Cowboy Boots

I’m continuing the painting portion of this toy. I’ve stained and finished all the mechanical pieces and almost have the man painted and ready for assembly. One of the elements important to me was the boots. I have several other carvings planned with boots, so I wanted to try something detailed, as far as the appearance of the boots. I did some research and thought this guy would look good in some Lucchese lizard-skin boots! I spent about 3 hours drawing and burning the designs on the boots.

I wanted enough details to make them appear realistic. But that doesn’t always mean putting in every detail. On a larger boot, I would have did the stitching and other things, but on something this small, the stitching would be too small to see, if it was in porportion to the rest of the things. I used to try to put in almost every single hair on something I was carving, but sometimes just indicating a feature or a shape is more realistic.

I spent about and hour and a half painting the first one, trying to get the colors and stuff like I wanted them. The other boot only took a half hour! I didn’t want them too wild, but I didn’t want just plain boots either. This guy is not shy about standing out in a crowd! Not much more to go! Thanks for looking!

It's ...........Aliveeeeeeee!!!!!!!

It works! That doesn’t always happen, for me! I still have a little tweaking to do on one cam, but this is pretty much how it will operate. I’ll be able to start on the painting and finishing next, which shouldn’t be too bad.
Of course, one of the things that slows me down, is all the “testing” I just have to do! So, as a thank you to those that have followed my blog, I decided to post a little preview of it in action. Thanks for everyone’s encouragement and comments!