Whittling away: Birdie

So I've been finding these burls on fallen branches of the trees at my workplace. They are poplar trees. Don't know what causes the growth but I've been carving off the softer outer layer to see what the wood looks like inside. This particular one had a particular look right away, so I whittled it down until I got it.

Tonight I painted it up just for fun.

I left the soft outer covering on the bottom part and left it unpainted. Looked more natural or something.