How to make purple heart

[rja]

I cut out the cow found in the Petersons' Animal Puzzle book. The cow is supposed to be a Holstein, I think, part white and part black. the Petersons used aspen and dyed alternating pieces black. I used ash since it is the lightest colored wood I have. Wanting to avoid using paint or dye I tried ebonizng the pieces. Ash only weakly ebonizes. So I moved on to black food coloring. Boy, this looks like it will really work and stains my fingers to boot. The pieces are jet black. But wait, it rubs off the wood and back onto the fingers, oh crap. Well, I'll "wash" the pieces in ebonizing fluid using an old tooth brush. OMG! the stickiness from the food coloring is gone including about 2/3 of the food coloring. The pieces are now a vibrant purple color just like that megabucks piece of purple heart wood I saw in Rocklers last weekend. I now have an ash and purple cow.

[wood-n-things]

Well,
They have purple cows don't they..
They give prune juice..

All the craze for the silver haired folks out there...Keeps em regular!

[lucky788scroller]

try using black india ink! Ive never heard of grape milk, but I now know what type of a cow it would come from!! By the way, the cutting looks great![/I]

[rja]

Anticipating a food coloring "freight train wreck" I bought some "Quink" from Staples on my lunch break . Quink is the modern day equivalent of india ink. This ink is made by Parker in France so it has to work, right? Holstein cows originated in Europe so this is only natural, n'est-ce pas? When the wood dries out I will try it and take another photo.

[Forester21]

I like the purple!
Did you try soaking the wood in tea before ebonizing it?
T

[rja]

I liked the purple color too, but who ever heard of a purple cow? Maybe it would give grape juice instead of milk. I did not try soaking the wood in tea because it had a gooey layer of food coloring on it. However, the Parker Quink did a nice job of blackening the pieces again. When this dries I will apply my finish and post a photo. This poor piece of ash has had enough. (But ash is tough; they make baseball bats out of it. It was surprisingly easy to scroll though). The next cow I will make out of white oak and the ebonizing will go nuts.

[scrollpup]

RJA, that piece is very "mooooving" And definetly purple! thanks for the tip!

Jerry

[sawdustus]

Purple Cow is the name of a well-known poem by Gelett Burgess, written in 1895:

I never saw a purple cow;
I never hope to see one;
but I can tell you anyhow;
I'd rather see than be one!

george

[Wood Dog]

Well yer gonna see one now....

[Pajaro]

Now that's a cow of a different color...