Ode to Bella

Hello all, this is my first project posting on Lumberjocks, though I have been enjoying other folks work here for some time. This is a 6”x6” curly maple plaque with a Bolivian rosewood inlay – a silhouette of Bella, my wife’s German Shepherd. I made this as a birthday present for her (my wife) :) The last pic is a 4’x4’ painting my wife made a few years ago, and served as the inspiration for this project.

This is my first ever inlay work – I used a Dremel with router housing attachment to route up to 1/16” or so from the outline, and finished it out with a small skew chisel. My plan was to fill any small gaps with fine maple sawdust and CA glue, but I discovered that maple sawdust turns a dark reddish brown when mixed with CA glue. Using rosewood dust was plan B, but I wanted to avoid that as much as possible so as not to distort the lines. Lesson learned.

Finally, I made a small easel style stand out of cut offs from the original piece maple. The finish is Minwax Polyurethane Clear Gloss – another first for me. I am giving it a couple of days to thoroughly dry before I attempt to buff it to a better shine.

Thanks very much for looking, and I appreciate all comments / critiques.

-- "Do, or do not. There is no try." ~Yoda