Air Force Retirement Gift

Cyber Retirement Gift

I recently had a good friend who was retiring from the Air Force and I wanted to make him something special as a gift.  He had a successful career in both the Intelligence career field and then as a Cyber operator, and his new journey in life is going to build upon both of those.  Often times, military retirees get shadow boxes created, but they can be rather large so I thought I’d make him something small and conversation provoking that he can simply have in his office or on a desk.  This small shadow box contained the two badges that show the mastery of his craft.

Built as a simple oak frame with a little acrylic blue inlay, and the badges floating around some silver vinyl lettering.

Doodling a Little Camper

little camper

We had a project for a Christmas present the I needed to draw up a little camper.  This was the cute little guy I ended up with.  I’ll post more about the final project after it is given.

Original idea sketched in Krita, then this design built out in Inkscape.

little camper shapes

Name Shelf – Emerson

Emerson Shelf with Toys

This was a present I made for our friend’s adorable bundle of cuteness, Emerson.  His first birthday is in a few weeks and we were home for the weekend so we decided to deliver it early.  It’s a pretty big deviation from my old designs for name shelves (here|here|here|here) but this one won’t cover the name when you use it and has a bunch of different places to put things.  The large letter is designed to unscrew from the back so they can easily finish it however they would like.  I previously teased this new design here.  Some process photos below.

Emerson Shelf plans

Thick Font

Emerson shelf back plate

Emerson shelf assembled

Emerson Shelf sanded

Window Cling Frame

Window Cling Frame

Hello 2018!  It’s been a busy last few months, so I am way behind posting stuff here.  But I have been working on a few projects that I took some pictures of, so here’s a few rapid-fire posts to catch up.

My wife keeps finding these really cute foil window cling stickers that we’ve decided to put into floating frames and give as gifts.  First, we figure out how we want to arrange them and then I build a custom frame to that size.  Short of cleaning the glass a dozen times, that’s all there is to it.

Window Cling Detail

Wooden Skeletor Art

Skeletor Wooden Sugar Skull

My son found this fancy looking Skeletor image on the internet and wanted to make something similar out of wood for his girlfriend.  We simplified and laid out the shapes on thr computer and then started cutting and painting.  He did most of the work, except for some tricky scrollsaw bits, and was very happy with how it turned out.

Skeletor Patterns

Skeletor Hood Routed

Skeletor Scrolling Face

Skeletor Face Painted

Skeletor Hood Painted

Skeletor Wooden Sugar Skull

LEGO Saturn V

LEGO Saturn V

For Father’s day this year, my family got me the LEGO Ideas Saturn V rocket.  It’s huge!  I have no idea where I’m going to display it.  I actually ran to the LEGO store here in town a few weeks prior once I saw they had sold out online and was lucky that they still had two left when I got there.  A couple shots from the build are below.

Saturn V Build

A Gift to the World

A Gift to the World

This week’s bulletin doodle.  Last night our church had our Children’s Christmas Cantata, which was absolutely adorable.  It was a simple reminder of God’s free gift to all of us.

For an added bonus, below is the cantata backdrop I made for the auditorium and our digital signage, last week’s bulletin doodle of Vader throwing down the imperial march, and a picture of our wooden Christmas tree after we got all the ornaments and lights on.

Great Big Story Backdrop

vader karoake

Wood Tree Decorated

Christmas Gift

Christmas gift

My church bulletin doodle from this morning.  Trying to make sure I remember the reason for this holiday season.

Paper Robot Penguin

Paper Robot Penguin

I was asked to help with this special Christmas gift for a friend’s wife.  He wanted a robot penguin keepsake, so this is the papercut design I just finished.  There are some process shots below and a few screenshots of building it all in inkscape.

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