Experimenting with Wood Burning

Sometimes I get the itch to do something crafty with a tool I’ve never used before. I’ve passed by the wood burning tools at the craft store many times but on a recent visit to Michaels the idea called out to me and so I thought I’d give it a go and try my hand at wood burning.

It was mostly what I expected, in a $30 kit there is a little hand held tool that you plug in and it comes with tips that you can use to form different shapes or patterns.

I played with a couple of the tips on a practice piece of cheap pine to start. (Use needle nose pliers to switch them out, they get hot!)

My first attempt was burning little jagged lines on a small box, with some repetition (and a few minor mistakes) I got the hang of it.

You have to accept imperfection with a tool like this especially as a novice! The smell of the burning wood reminded me of a cross between a campfire and burnt popcorn. If you don’t object to those smells, you may like playing with this tool too.

This simple but pretty little box I’ll use to collect spare coins in the laundry room.

 

 

My next attempt was making little herb markers with wooden spoons, a cute idea at first but I’m feeling “meh” about the result.

Trying to burn letters proved more challenging than I thought.

And on reflection I wondered what’s the point of making plant labels when hello I know the three types of herbs that are growing in my kitchen window. I wouldn’t stick “My Name Is…” labels on my kids so I had to ask myself “Kate why are you marking your herbs? Are you afraid you’ll get confused?”

 

Moving on.

I do like how the wood cutting board turned out, I had an extra bamboo board that I played with, and in the kit was a tip that turned out to be a perfect little leaf shape.

 

 

It was a fun toy to play with, a bit frustrating at first when you can’t get it to do exactly what you want, but if you practice and accept imperfection it can lead to something good. Have you tried wood burning for yourself yet?

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