Riddle Me This. What's Better Than 1 Elephant?

While we all work on World Peace, you can stimulate your thinking by making and assembling an elephant puzzle made out of 6 little sub-elephant puzzle pieces. BTW, it's the first time I ever used sub-elephant in a sentence. Maybe fractal elephant puzzle is a better name.

Supplies

Supplies

Wood (4"x8") I used Oak
Elephant Puzzle Pattern ( You can you can use mine at a pattern or Google it.) (1M time I used google it.)
Carbon Paper
Sandpaper (120, 240 Grint)
Shellac Finish (or as you like)

Tools

Scroll Saw or Coping Saw
Drill or Drill Press
Sandling Block

Trace the Pattern

Grab some carbon paper and trace your elephant puzzle pattern on to your wood. You might have to touch up the carbon trace where it didn't transfer on to the wood as well as you like. At this step, it's a good idea to drill the 'fants eye holes while the piece is large and easy to handle.

Cut Out Elephant Outline & Sand

I was excited for this step since I just purchased some spiral scroll saw blades and wanted to try them out for the first time. A spiral blade makes it easy to cut out the pieces since it can cut in any direction. If you don't have a scroll saw you can use a coping saw ... it will just take a bit longer. However, you can often pick up a decent scroll saw on Craigslist for ~$50. Perhaps a good birthday or holiday gift idea for the kiddies.

Once you release your elephant from his wooden cage, it's a good idea to sand the edges to smooth them out.

Release the Sub-Elephants

Now carefully and slowly go around your pattern to extract the 6 sub-elephants. The spiral blade makes for tight connections so assembly looks great. Sand the pieces as needed to make them nice to hold and easier to assemble.

Finish and Finish

Next I apply my homemade shellac-based friction polish (it's googleable) and assemble. Assembly is not as easy as it looks! Maybe it's a memory thing.

Optional Step: Call someone in your family or a friend and say "I'll give you $1Million dollars if you can guess what I just made."

Trust me it's a safe bet ... unless they are a sub-elephant fanatics.

Enjoy!