A wood burning tool.
I’ve always wondered how hard they were to use. Honestly I thought it would be easy. Standing in the store with a gift card in one hand and a 40% coupon in the other, wood crafts started swirling through my cluttered brain and it was time. Oh yea, it was time to conquer the wood burning tool!
I got home, ripped open that package and grabbed an extra piece of wood from the garage. I let it heat for a few seconds and pressed it to the wood. Nothing. Of course I got the defective one that I would have to drag back to Hobby Lobby, not leaving without a $75 bill. Who can go to Hobby Lobby just to return things? No one.
I just sat there with it still plugged in, moping and playing on my phone. Then I noticed that the tip was turning dark blue and slightly smoking. It turns out you actually have to wait for it to heat up. Goodness I felt a little ridiculous.
Long story short, it was not easy. There were dark spots and dark rough edges galore on the scrap piece of wood. A few days later I decided to do a wood burn design on a wooden christmas ornament. Once again it didn’t look too great.
After some practice and using a printable to transfer the perfect design, I was able to make this plague for my father-in-law. He thought it was store bought, which made my head swell 5 sizes.
But this isn’t just about wood burning. Yes, it’s a great craft that seems to be gaining in popularity lately and you should try it.
But since I opened the package, the tool has been sitting on my kitchen counter because I’ve used it for so much more than just wood burning.
- On christmas I was trying to get a cable tie off of one of the girls toys that was holding the toy into the packaging. The cable tie was so tight that I couldn’t cut it off. But I could burn it off!
- Our new (fake) christmas tree woudn’t fit in the storage boxes we already had. One end of the tree was way too long. So what did I do? I used the wood burning tool to cut a circle out of the box that was the perfect size to slide the end of the tree through while leaving most of the tree protected in the storage box. My husband thought I was a genius.
- The other day I used it to stick the plastic back of a fake flower onto a plastic headband by melting the plastic and holding it together until it set.
- My favorite project using it so far has been these Christmas Sparkle Balls – They are gorgeous! Using plastic cups, I was able to melt the plastic sides together to form a globe shape.
It turns out that this tool is not only great for wood but for working for plastic as well.
Don’t worry, I have a lot more projects planned such as customizing wooden jewelry and maybe seeing what the effects of the high heat is on leather or DecoMesh. Amazon.com even has a book on Pyrography Basics! Apparently that’s what you call the art of wood burning.
Have you tried wood burning or any other crafts that use a wood burning tool? What do you think about it?
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I love my wood burning tool! It’s also amazing for cutting and sealing ribbon at the same time. I have a metal ruler that I use as a straight edge when cutting with it, and I use a piece of glass from a picture frame on top of my fabric cutting mat as a burning surface so I can easily measure out my lengths without burning my mat. Coins or tire pressure gauges are great to use as heat safe templates for burning/cutting the edge of ribbon into a curve with the wood burning tool too..
I had no clue! Thanks for the great tip!
I would love to know if you ended up trying this out on poly deco mesh? I am looking for a way to keep the cut edges of deco mesh from fraying when making flower wreaths or ruffle technique wreaths that use lots of cut pieces of deco mesh that fray. I would be buying the tool specifically for this reason, so I would love to know in advance if it works!
I have not but I use it all the time on the craziest things. I have sealed the ends of ribbon with it (with a very light touch to keep it from burning).