Anything to use up some of those scraps piled around my work bench…

Lisa came up with the idea of making little wood houses for holiday gifts. I could paint the sides with blackboard paint to write a special message for each recipient. And I could draw a cartoon on one end. Add decorative ribbon on top and voila’, a holiday gift!

I cut the house shapes out of 4×4 redwood scraps, then primed them. As I like to do, I took a picture of one (second image) and drew on it in my cell phone, working out the colors and look (third image).

Happy with the sketch, we went into production, making 11 houses (fourth and fifth images). When they were all done, I couldn’t help assembling them into cat cartoon streets (bottom images). You have to admit, they look pretty neat!