One tree 木 is a tree. Two trees, standing shoulder to shoulder, are the woods. The scribes needed no new drawing — they simply let the forest grow out of the trees, exactly the way real woods do. Chinese counts with pictures.
A piece of culture
Shaolin: the young forest The most famous 林 in the world stands on Mount Song: the Shaolin temple, 少林寺 — "the monastery in the young forest". Founded in 495 CE, it became the legendary home of Chan (Zen) Buddhism and of kung fu: monks who trained body and mind together in the woods. Fifteen centuries later, "Shaolin" is still the word for martial-arts mastery — and you can now read the forest in its name.
Use it in a real word
山林
shānlín · saan1 lam4
mountain forest — the wild woods, both characters yours already