A Vet for My Vet

I am lucky to have a decent exotics vet so close to where I work and live.  Every year for the holidays I give the Windhover Veterinary Center a box of my almond butter crunch and ginger star cookies (along with a goofy guinea pig card).  It's part thank you and part offering to the Pet Gods.  Perhaps if they're appeased, I won't have to make so many visits to the vet in the new year?  So far the goodies are loved by the staff, but the gods have not been placated.  Oh, well.

A rough likeness of my vet, with the mumps?

This year I decided to make an ornament for my vet as well as the usual goodies for the staff.  I thought it would be a fun project.  And it was, although the execution was trickier than I had imagined.

The idea was to have my vet surrounded by a bunch of animals.  The number of animals decreased as I ran into difficulties.  The parrot, which I thought might be complicated, turned out to be the easiest piece of the bunch.  I've sculpted bunnies before, so that wasn't too difficult.  The cat was challenging - I wasn't sure what to do with the legs.  Even the lab coat had issues!  The white stuck to everything.  I had brief thoughts of a guinea pig or a rat, but the rabbit was so small, I didn't want to try anything smaller.

Then I discovered the toaster oven has hot-spots.  This ornament lucked out - one sleeve ended up a little dirty and the grey kitty cat ended up a bit browner than it started out  both the vet and the rabbit have slightly shiny toes.  But the scorching was kept at a minimum.  Given all that white of the lab coat, I was thrilled!

This is the first time I've tried to make an ornament based on a real person.  I've matched the color of her hair... and that's probably about it.  Regardless, I think it's cute.  I hope she likes it.  At least I know the toffee will be a hit!  Do you think the Pet Gods will be satisfied this year?