Adventures in Wood Burning

Lately I have been thinking a lot about trying wood burning again.  Last year, around October, a 4th grade teacher at the school where I work was doing an art project of wood burning.  A few of the kids in our class were participating with his kids and so he let me borrow a wood burner and he gave me some wood that I could try on when I asked him more about it.  I found an awesome picture of a tiger and decided that I wanted to try a tiger rather then the chipmunk, covered wagon, or coyote type things he was having his students do, I think he was trying to stick with the Utah history, pioneer type theme for his curriculum. The tiger was much cooler.  It was a lot of fun, and even though there are spots that look a bit weird he turned out pretty great, in my opinion.  I still need to put a glaze over the whole thing from what I've been told but I just haven't quite gotten around to it.

(This isn't the greatest picture of this guy but it was the best I could get)

I had a blast working on this tiger, so much so, that I went out and bought my very own wood burner.  Basically, I got it for free because I had a 50% off coupon for Robert's and was given a $15.00 gift card for my birthday earlier that year.  I only ended up paying about a dollar for the tax. 

When I finished off my tiger I went about looking for more wood to burn.  I decided that a pretty box with a burned peacock would be perfect for my sister Sarah's Christmas present.  I found a great wooden box made of basswood.  But basswood is a very soft wood and it burned way too quickly.  My fancy new wood burner does not have a temperature adjuster and I could barely press the hot blade to the wood before the wood burned all around the blade as well.  I was disgusted, to say the least, and was extremely discouraged by the whole experience.  I didn't get quite half way finished with the peacock before I gave that idea up and I haven't touched the wood burner since.  There were too many fine lines that would have all blurred together if I had kept going.  And honestly it looks really fuzzy and pretty much terrible.

I think that I am about over that disappointment and I am ready to try again.  I will definitely not buy wood at Robert's because all they have is basswood or some other kind that is even softer then the basswood.  It almost feels foamy.  I think I'm going to have to hit up Home Depot and cut up some wood myself.  It will probably be cheaper that way anyway.  Wish me luck in my future wood burning endeavors.