How to make a wood-slice monkey

Get guests smiling and laughing at the monkey behavior around the dinner table with animal faces made from wood slices. These fun faces are great as place holders at a casual gathering. They also look fantastic in a child's room or nursery and liven up a kitchen when placed on cabinet doors.

The tutorial uses browns to mimic certain monkey species in the wild, but that doesn't mean you have to stick to that color scheme. Want an orangutan? Use orange felt and add orange yarn to the top of the larger wood slice to emulate hair. For a children's gathering, get a little unrealistic and use bright colors such as purple or green.

Materials
- Wood slice, 4 to 6 inches in diameter
- Dark-brown felt
- Tailor's chalk
- Scissors
- Hot glue gun
- Hot glue sticks
- Light-brown felt
- 3 wood slices, 1 1/2 inches in diameter
- Black felt

1. Place the larger wood slice on the dark-brown felt. Trace around it. Cut out the circle.

2. Run a line of glue around the inner perimeter of the wood. Adhere the felt circle. Trim excess felt.

3. Cut out a peanut-shell shape from the light-brown felt. Each rounded end should be 1-inch wide and 1-inch high. Glue this shape horizontally on the dark-brown felt, slightly below the wood slice's top edge. These are the eyes.

4. Apply glue to half of the bottom face of one small wood slice. Press the round to the back of the larger wood piece at the northeast position. Repeat with the other small round at the northwest position.

5. Apply glue to the back of the third small slice. Press it on the lower center of the dark-brown felt. It should cover part of the eyes. This is the nose.

6. Cut out two small black circles. Glue one each in the centers of the rounded portions of the eyes.

7. Cut out a small, rounded black triangle. Turn it point down. Glue it on the upper center of the nose.