Easy Wooden Gifts for Beginners: Carrot Figurine Carving Guide
This blog post teaches you to make simple wooden gifts that are easy to learn even for beginner wood carvers. The carrot figurine is simple, with no excessive detail to carve into its surface, and we've added a base so that it can be placed on a tabletop as an ornament or as a handmade gift for friends. Let's look at how it was made!
Sketch the front and side of the carrot figurine.
We use basswood to make wooden gifts. The shape of this piece favors the rectangular form, so when choosing wood, you can just use rectangular blocks of basswood. Start with a simple pencil drawing of the front of the carrot, followed by the two sides and the back. Draw two parallel horizontal lines at the top and bottom of the carrot, with the carrot's leaves above the top line and an oval shape in the center.
Trim the shape according to the draft.
Put on your gloves and take a knife to cut the rough shape. At first, you can be bold and cut off the unused edges until you get close to the outline line and start to slow down. Take care to keep the leaf and the base in this step.
Continue to deepen and refine the shape of the wooden figurine.
We continue to carve the details of the wooden gift, and with a rough shape you can gouge the highlights along the way and continue to deepen the shaving.
- Clearly divide the leaf section from the carrot body.
- Narrow the base section.
- The whole will take the shape of a “vase”.
- Use a carving knife to dig out the leafy part, you can modify the shape of the leaf by yourself.
Carve out the irregular patterns and color the whole thing.
Carve the surface of the leaf and the main part. If you are not familiar with carving lines, please refer to our previous tutorial. Finally, use water-based dyes to color the leaves orange and green, paint them and let them dry!
Wrap-up
One of our easiest wooden gifts to make, the carrot figurine is simple and unique as a handmade tabletop ornament. The bright orange color combines perfectly with the wooden base, making it an eye-catcher in the afternoon sun, so go ahead and make your own!
