After 4 days of waiting for the postman, my birthday present from friends is all here. A heatproof mat, some wooden shapes, some finishing oil and a pyrography set! I had a brief dalliance with pyrography last summer when I used Dave’s soldering iron to burn the numbers to 20 into discs of wood for school. (The soldering iron came off worst but the less said about that the better!) I decided I’d quite like to give it a whirl properly so I was quite excited when the postie delivered it this morning.

I researched pyrography basics online and was a little disheartened to discover most sites deemed it to be a suitable hobby for men or older children (no mention of 30 something ladies hooked on craft. Not even once!) Despite the internet telling me it was not something I should be doing I proceeded to plug the pyrography tool anyway. I’m not sure how it was going to identify that a woman was using it, and it didn’t self destruct as I switched it on so I presumed I was fairly safe.

There were lots of rather attractive designs online and most sites referred to using carbon paper. I’m sure I have some in Narnia (also known as the dresser in the conservatory) but I thought since I was going against the rules by actually participating in the unwomanly art of wood burning that I’d just keep doing things my way. I used one of my new craft stamps and ordinary black ink to stamp on to the wood and guess what-I survived! The ink didn’t bleed into the grain of the wood as much as I thought it would and I set to work with my new (and very hot) toy.

It was quite hard to determine what level of pressure was appropriate, and going across the wood grain meant I got some uneven results. The results weren’t perfect and I found curved lines tricky at first too. I think more practise might be in order, but I had fun trying. The smell of burning wood is also strangely pleasant, though I’m not sure it will do my delicate feminine lungs much good. I couldn’t resist adding some faux stitching with the heat tip-it’s one of my favourite cardmaking finishes too. I’m hoping further attempts will work better as I have some grand plans for allotment related things.

My first attempt, warts and all. Not too bad for a girl! What do you think?