So I like making harry potter wands. This Christmas just passed my university friends and I had a Hogwarts themed Christmas party so I went a little mad and made about 7 wands for everyone.

My wands are usually very simple. Willow grows in our garden like crazy so I’m never short of easily carved lengths of wood to play with.

I of course had made myself a wand to go with my Hogwarts robes, this one was hazel and although simple I liked it. Except that 5 minutes before I went in to watch the final Harry Potter film this happened:

I was kind of upset by this but then I thought it was the perfect chance for me to make a new fancy one for myself.

This is the first time I’ve properly tried to use a dremel for an actually project. The others ties i was just trying to figure out which attachment did what.
I started by sawing a new piece of willow and stripping it of the bark. I picked a slightly thicker piece that usual because I new I’d be carving into it quite deeply.

I drew a simple design in pencil and used a stanley knife to carve out a basic cut line for the design.

I then started using the dremel to sand away from the outline to create a smooth design. unfortunately near the end when I wasn’t paying attention the sanding attachment came loose and spun off, hit the wall and broke. thankfully it didn’t hit me or any of the cats and I was almost finished the sanding anyway 🙂

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I then used sand paper to finish off and smooth the rest of the wood. I then highlighted the design in gold metallic paint.

I decided to stain the wood with brown watercolour paint and redid some of the gold, where my hands had slipped 🙂

I had planned on varnishing once the paint had dried but decided against it. I might come back and do it but for now I’m happy with the slight rustic look. Also it turns out that the design I chose was exactly simple for my first dremel project but at least i’ll be more confident next time. And now the finished product, I used black leather thonging to wrap around the handle. Next time I think I’ll sand and shape the handle before doing the rest of the wand as it would be easier 🙂

Although the most fun part of this project was chasing my cat through the house after he had stepped in a glob of gold paint. I managed to catch him and wash it off before too much damage was done, he wasn’t happy lol 🙂