To everything there is a season, and sometimes, in life, you just have to make a deer head. I am smitten with all things antlers these days, and probably have more
deer-head-type things hanging on my walls that I ought, none of which are made from actual deer parts, FYI. I really have to learn how to edit, but this was love at first sight. What can you do?
I stumbled across
this project while browsing my daily blogs, and immediately sent the link to my most crafty friend. Within minutes, this crafty friend was standing before me saying, "We have to make them." And I said, "Yes." And she said, "But we should make them out of wood." And I said, "Absolutely." Yep, that's pretty much how it started.
First, a mini
foamcore deer head prototype was created (more out of deer head project excitement than anything else, really), and revealed that the proportions of the pattern do NOT match the proportions of the deer head in the project photo. And the slits are not the correct depth for keeping all the parts aligned properly. So together we redesigned some of the pieces, correctly measured the depth of the slits, created a new pattern, and started searching for materials. My friend is much more of a grown up than I, so she actually owns power tools AND, most importantly, a place to make a mess. So we gathered our materials and got together for
Woodshop Saturday! 2 band saws, 1 jigsaw, 1 belt sander, 1 electric hand sander, 1 D
remel, some sweat, little to no blood, zero tears, and a couple bagels later we had our deer head pieces.
Ok, I glossed over the hard parts. The project was actually more challenging than we had anticipated. But I hadn't played with power tools in a very long time, so it was WAY fun. Would I do it again? Probably not. Am I glad I did it the first time? Oh, you betcha.
My friend's deer head will likely remain as is, with just the natural wood grain, perhaps just a clear coat to finish it. She has what's known as "good taste." For me, when it comes to stylized deer hear wall hangings, I tend to go big or go home. I chose some fabulous, kitschy, flocked paper that I found
here, and spent quite a bit of time gluing, trimming, and painting the exposed edges. In retrospect, I should have cut the slits a bit wider. I had a nice, snug fit after all my cutting, which was shot all to heck when it scraped up my beautiful paper upon assembly.
Argh. But I worked with it, finally got the thing together, disguised the mistakes, and the overall result is pretty
flippin' sweet, if I do say so, myself. :)
I wish I had a better photo of the deer head. Alas, there is no light. There is only rain.
