Spiral Wood Pendant Necklace.

I had a piece of white oak which came from a tree that was cut down in 91. When I was growing up the tree was always there towering over me. It's sad that the tree is no longer with us but at least now I can keep a part of it with me wherever I go.

Tools & materials needed:

Safety glasses

Hearing protection

dremel rotary tool with router bits & fiberglass cutoff wheel

template

drill & small bit

flexible super glue

elmers glue

acrylic paints

wood stain, pre-stain, polyurathane ( I used miniwax brand )

sandpaper 150-400 grit depending on how smooth you want your piece

woodburning kit

tiny screw, screwdriver, & small solid strand copper wire

Faux strand

First thing needed was a design so I searched until finally deciding on a spiral star. I printed it out proper size & used elmers glue to glue it on my piece of white oak wood.

When the glue dried & template was firmly in place I got out my dremel & used a combinate of 2 different sized routing bits as well as a fiberglass cutting wheel to carefully cut along the lines. I then kept routing more & more wood away the entire depth of my slab of wood (probably 1/2"-3/4 thick) which took a couple of hours. Once I had the shape cut out of the slab I then focused on rounding the edges with the router bit & fiberglass cutoff wheel. I used a penny to mark a circle in the center to cut out which I originally planned on inserting a penny with my birthdate but decided to do a design there instead. I used the router bit to cut out the center circle 1/8" deep. I also cut out little spiral triangular sections 1/8" deep on each of the 8 spiral arms. Once all this cutting was finished I used 150 grit sandpaper to sand it down a bit smoother. I then used a wood burner to darken areas of the wood giving it an aged look as well as smoothing it up a bit more.

Now I was ready to stain my piece. I used miniwax prestain & dipped the entire piece in & wiped off excess with a cloth. I allowed about 5-10 minutes for the prestain to soak in & then used gunstock oak miniwax stain & dipped entire piece in it & removing excess with cloth. I let the stain dry overnight & next day used acrylic paint to add the color to the center & spiral arm recesses. I let this set overnight since the paint was thick to make the center spiral effect & wanted to be sure it was dry before coating it in miniwax polyurathane.

With the paint dried I made a hanger for the necklace out of a small piece of solid copper wire. I found a tiny screw 1/8" long & drilled a tiny hole for the screw. I shaped the copper with small pliers & had the twist of the wire going clockwise since that's the direction the screw would be tightening. Once I got the screw snug I folded the copper sticking out back over on to itself & used flexible super glue around it all using a toothpick to get it into all the tiny places around the screw & wire. I allowed the glue a few hours to dry & then used a piece of wire through the necklace loop to hang the piece from so I could dip it in the miniwax semi-gloss polyurathane. This not only helps protect the piece but make it's look nice as well. I allowed overnight for it to dry & used a strand of faux to run through the loop & tied the ends to finish my necklace.