Hand Carved Tattoo Picture From a Leftover Project

My daughter wanted something special for Christmas so I gave her a hand made gift. I carved her a tattoo picture.

1- First I found a leftover piece of wood from another project I was working on.

2- After finding just the right piece I sanded both sides smooth.

3- After sanding the wood I had my daughter find a tattoo design she liked and I printed it off.

4- I took the picture and cut it down to fit the piece of wood.

5- I used a glue stick on the back of the picture to attach it to the wood.

6- I waited about 10 minutes to let the glue dry and used an carving knife to trace the lines.

7- After I have the lines cut I started slowly chipping out around the design for my edges so I wouldn't chip out any of the design when I used my gouges to remove the extra wood.

8- After I got the outline done I went around the edge if the wood about 1/4 " for the boarder .

9- After getting the boarder chipped out I started using a curved gouge to remove the extra wood.

10- On the smaller places where I had small waist wood I used my V gouge to ad the depth of the leaves , stems , hearts and the cherries.

11- After carving out all the waist wood I used 220 , 320 and 400 grit sandpaper to smooth all the edges and to put in the rounded detail were there was round edges to make the design POP.

12. After the finale sanding I painted the design and back ground.

13- I used three shades of green , dark red and a bright red.

14- After the paint was dry I went over the design with clear glittery poster paint.

15- After the paint was dried I hammered a picture hanging hook on the back.

16- My finale step was putting two coats of clear coat on and let it dry for about three hours.

This was my first hand carving picture and it was a great experience in learning more in doing woodworking and also giving alot of respect for those woodworkers that mastered the art of hand carving wood into works of art. Hope everyone enjoys this instructable.