Forming Rhok'delar, Longbow of the Ancient Keepers - Part 2

For the beginning of this project, see: Forming Rhok'delar, Longbow of the Ancient Keepers - Part 1

Long has my epic bow sat unfinished, but no more. When I left off in part one, I was waiting for the paper strips to dry. The next step was to cover the bow in CelluClay. The final product was very hard and strong without being too heavy, but even thought the box said it could be sanded, sandable it was not. Either that, or I have the crappiest sandpaper ever made, because when I went to sand the CelluClay, it knocked the sand off my sandpaper. I did have better luck using steel wool to sand the bow, but in the end, what I had to do was cover the entire bow in a layer of spackle, then sand that down to get a smooth finish. I like to use the kind that starts out pink and turns white as it dries, so you know exactly when you can move on to the next step.

After the spackle was smoothed and dusted, it was time to paint. Faux painting is always a trial-and-error process for me, even though I've been doing it for years. I used the 3D model viewer on WoWhead to try to get the colors and textures as close to in-game as possible. After it dried, I coated it in Mod Podge to seal it. Once that was done, all that was left was to wrap the vines I'd made around the bow and glue them on. I didn't take any pictures of the vine-making process, but it was fairly simple. I took some newspaper

 pages and twisted them together into rope in the length that I needed. Then I wrapped up the newspaper rope in some green floral tape. I didn't want it to be all one color, so I dabbed on a contrasting green acrylic paint to add interest. Then, I wrapped around some faux-floral morning glory garland. Morning glories are closest to the type of flower that blooms on Rhok'delar, so that's what I used. Here's the final finished product:

I wasn't overly pleased with how this turned out, to be honest. I felt it looked rather cartoonish. I think my painting skills were taking a holiday. My sister-in-law and her husband both disagreed with me, though. They said it looked fantastic. Perhaps I'm being my own worst critic, but I think I can do better. What do you think?