Welcome back 🙂 Today’s post is a little different, as I’m trying a new-to-me craft: wood whittling! Unlike previous posts, I will not be focusing on reuse and sustainability here. I did, in fact, buy all the material from craft stores and Amazon. I am a big proponent of not putting undo pressure on yourself. Nobody lives perfectly ‘sustainably’ and if you enjoy a hobby then I believe it is worth doing, even if it contributes in some way to an undesirable system. Not every problem in the world is up to you to fix. Do your best where you can and make sure you have balance in your life.That being said, I hope this can serve as a whittling guide for those looking to wade into the wood carving world 🙂
Material
First part of this whittling guide: material. You don’t need a lot of material to start this hobby. I purchased the following:
Must Haves:
- Knives – I purchased two whittling knives. One larger for roughing out the shape and one smaller for detail work. You could probably get away with one, though.
- Wood – I had some basswood blanks I had purchased at Hobby Lobby years ago. Other woods that would be good for whittling are white pine and cedar, as they are soft as well. You can use fresh wood you scavenge, known as ‘green wood’ that is super easy to carve, but it may crack as it dries.
- Gloves – A must-have in my opinion. I didn’t injure myself during this adventure and as much as I would like to say it was because of my flawless technique; it wasn’t. It was the gloves.
- Sandpaper – I chose a pack of three grits of increasing fineness.
- Wood Finish – I chose a beeswax polish, but you can also paint or shellac your finished work.
- Knife Sharpening Kit *not pictured* – This is a must. A sharp knife is a safe knife.
Optional:
- Coping Saw – This helped speed up the whittling process. I explain this later in the post.
Safety
Second part of this whittling guide: safety. A little note about safety. I don’t feel qualified to give any true safety guidelines for wood whittling, but from my research and short experience it seems like there are a few golden rules.
- Keep your knife sharp. A dull knife is a dangerous knife. The sharper your knife, the more efficient it will be and the less force you have to use to cut the wood. Keeping your knife sharp leads to fewer accidents.
- Cut away from your major arteries (femoral and radial arteries). This is common sense but make sure that if your knife slips it isn’t going anywhere major. Don’t carve on your legs! I usually carved sitting at a table or sitting at a chair with something substantial between myself and my lap. I also exclusively used push cuts and stop cuts. A push cut is a controlled cut away from you and is a good one to go with when you are starting out.
- Wear gloves. It isn’t the most comfortable but I think it is super necessary. I am a big wuss and was afraid of hurting myself. Not about that life.
- Keep pets clear when using sharp implements! I always made sure Jacko was no where near when I was whittling.
I found this video from Doug Linker on youtube which goes into much more detail. Safety first, friends!
A Beginners Process
Step 1 – Sketch
While this is probably an optional part of a beginner’s whittling guide, I began by sketching out some specific species of mushrooms to get familiar with their form. I chose two species that are native to Western Pennsylvania. Entoloma vernum and Boletus edulis. This helped me get more familiar with the curves and angles in both mushrooms, as well as plan out different mushroom ‘poses’ for my overall composition. The rest of this post will primarily be focusing on the creation of my three Boletus edulis, because I found that the Entoloma vernum were smaller, more fiddly, and not nearly as successful for my beginner’s attempt.
Step 2 – Plan
Next, I – with Jacko’s help of course – drew out my mushrooms on the basswood blanks. This method helped guide me in roughing out the shapes as well as in the next step of scoring the blanks.
Step 3 – Prep
A tip I saw in most every ‘mushroom whittling’ tutorial was to pre-score the blanks where the cap of the mushroom began and stem ended. This technique allowed me to whittle the basic shapes much faster. Instead of having to do a million stop-cuts at that point, I could simply use push cuts with the stop already in place.
Step 4 – Whittle forever
This, of course, was the longest and most labor-intensive portion. Even though the blanks are small at first glance, once you begin whittling you realize just how much wood you have to get through. As I have mentioned before, I used almost exclusively push-cuts and stop-cuts. Generally, I found it easiest to begin at the corners and work out from there.
The general order of operations I used was to rough out the mushroom cap first, followed by the mushroom stem. I generally whittled to the outline that I had drawn, and then worked the marked up sides down afterwards.
At the end of this step, I had created very rough mushrooms with all of my whittling marks very visible. Some people like this look and consider it part of the beauty of the craft. I can definitely see that, but I wanted to create a more realistic look. I therefore took my mushrooms on to the next step: sanding!
Step 5 – Sand
I used three different grits of sand paper: 100 followed by 150 followed by 220. I sanded the knife marks almost entirely out of the caps of the mushrooms, while leaving some on the stems for texture.
Step 6 – Finish Wood
Finally, the last and most satisfying step! I used a beeswax-based wood finish and gave my mushrooms a thorough coating and buffing. This gave the blonde color of the wood a reddish hue which was truly beautiful.
Final Thoughts
And here they are! They are the cutest and I am so pleased with my first attempt at whittling. I have a lot of learning to do, but I am excited to have these little guys grace my desk 🙂
Pros and Cons from a beginner’s perspective:
As this is a new craft for me, I wanted to give my thoughts on whittling in general, in case this inspires anyone to try it out!
Pros
- Satisfying. The feeling and sound of cutting away the wood is addicting, and the nice polished surface it leaves behind is beautiful.
- Inexpensive. Once your basic tools are purchased, the cost of ongoing supplies isn’t very much, and you can even scavenge a lot of your materials!
- Portable. If you’ve got a knife and a piece of wood, you can whittle. No need for any stationary equipment/a large amount of space.
Cons
- It takes some strength. This isn’t necessarily a con, but it was a bit for me. My hands definitely hurt after whittling for a few minutes, and it is a serious forearm workout. To be honest though, I think most of the hand strain I experienced was because the basswood blanks were actually too wide for my hands! I may try narrower blanks next time.
- Detail is hard to achieve. This is most likely because I am a beginner and lack the skills. For example, I wanted to make the characteristic ridges underneath the cap on my Entoloma vernum but as this was perpendicular to the grain of the wood I couldn’t figure out how to do it.
- A bit scary at first. Any activity using a sharp knife has some inherent danger involved. However, I felt a lot better wearing gloves and following basic safety guidelines.
I will definitely be trying more whittling projects as well as woodcarving in general. I hope you found my beginner’s whittling guide helpful! My next attempt may be using a Dremel to carve wood and comparing the two processes.
