Homemade Christmas Tree

With the help of my son's youngest children my tree is up for this year. I decided to use a 4 foot tree instead of my huge one I usually use. Every ornament on the tree is handmade and has a story. There are knitted and crocheted ornaments. My oldest daughter, Mandy, has a ceramic ball ornament that she made in girl scouts and a plastic canvas penguin she made a few years ago. My youngest daughter has a teddy bear she made in kindergarten and a bear spoon ornament that was made for her by my Mother when Cyndy was small. Mariah, my oldest granddaughter has a tiny moccasin to represent her heritage and a marshmallow snowman she made in Headstart. My son's tree holds his ornament he made in cub scouts and his children's ornaments.

Here in this close up you can see the polymer clay ornaments I made this year and a few of my mini hats, bells and winter wear I knitted and crocheted.

The angel at the top is always the crowning glory. My youngest daughter was killed in an automobile accident on November 17, 2001. This angel looks just like her and is always at the top of my tree. I made her out of porcelain and lace. You can see Cyndy's photo peaking out of the left side of the angel.

Christmas Ornaments

I was blog surfing today and saw pictures of the cutest Christmas Ornaments made out of ceramic clay. http://jenniferjangles.blogspot.com/ . I decided to give it a try with polymer clay and my tinted TLS from an earlier post. Here are the step (tutorial I guess) to make these.

I used about 4 ounces of translucent premo, a piece of green, cadmium red ad zinc yellow to tint the translucent clay along with my tinted TLS and numerous small cookie cutters. I rolled out the translucent clay on the thickest setting in my pasta machine to get it conditioned. I divided it into 3 sections and then added the red, green and yellow.

Here is the translucent clay mixed and rolled out on the largest setting in the pasta machine to prepare for the small cookie cutters I will be using.

Here are the shapes I cut from the clay with the cookie cutters. You can't tell in the photo but they look and feel like jello jigglers.

I decided to swirl a bit of each color to make the bells. I then used a toothpick to paint on the dots and decorations onto the ornaments. You can't see it here but I used the point on the toothpick to start a hole to drill out after they are baked. Here is a photo of the ornaments with the clay and TLS unbaked. You can see the colors on the clay.

I decided to use some gold premo rolled out on the thickest setting and cut out some gingerbread men. I poked a hole in the top with the toothpick and then painted the decorations on with the toothpick and tinted TLS. This is also before baking.

I then baked them in a 250 degree toaster oven (thermometer tested) for 20 minutes and then dunked them in an ice water bath, partially for the translucent clay and partially for my impatience. I then cave them a coating on future polish for a shine.

When the future was dry I used my wire jug and wound some black and violet wire to make cute individual hangers.

Here is a close up all finished and ready to go on a tree. The translucent premo and the tinted TLS look like jello int eh lights and the gold have a mica shimmer. As you can see, the tinted TLS turned out great.

Beads and Charms Finished

I spent today baking, sanding, buffing and polishing my beads and charms. Here is what I finished.

Cherry Chocolate, Candy Corn, Sucker and 2 Cupcakes

Apple, Carrot and Peas

Popsicles, Orange and Chocolate Creamsicle

Donuts

Pumpkin Pie with whippy and Cinnamon Roll with Icing

White Cake with Chocolate icing and Pink icing. The pink is so pale you can't see it in the photo. I used my tiny purple flower cane from the play dough experiment for decoration.

Cupcake with pink icing and orange slices, juicy cheese burger

All the charms from today in one pile ready to go.

Natasha chop beads using cane ends from my bone/translucent leaf cane ends and the tiger skin cane ends. The ice water bath straight out of the oven gave the translucent a lot of depth.

These lentil swirl beads are made using the cane ends from a breast cancer ribbon cane I made. I think I am finally getting the hang of the swirl.

Paint Pot Experiment - A Success

I mixed up my tinted TLS in a tiny paint pot strip like you get with paint by the numbers. I ordered them from http://www.hofcraft.com/paintingaccessories-paintcontainers.htm.


It has been almost 4 weeks and the paint pots DO NOT react to the polymer clay. YAHOO!!! I took one strip of 8 paint pots that are joined and mixed a separate basic color in each pot. Each has it's own lid and all the pots are connected which makes it easier to grab and go. The only thing I did was to clip the side piece that connects the lids to each other. They are still connected to the pots but each can open without having to open all of them.

Here are the steps I followed:

A blob of TLS in each pot with bits of clay added for the color. I clipped the lid connectors before I added the TLS so each one can open without opening the others.

Here is a close up shot.

30 minutes after mixing the TLS and clay mixture. The bits of clay are breaking down to tint the TLS. So far so good.

Close up.

Here is the tints 4 weeks later. Brilliant colors, fully mixed and the pots have had no reaction to the clay. Now to do the same with my metallic and pearl color clays.

Jade and Ivory set

I finally used the faux jade and ivory beads I created. You can see the different colors used in each bead. I love the jade but my next batch will have a more "creamy jade" look I hope as this batch seen was colored with pearl ex powders. Great shades but too much sparkle for jade.

You can see the veins in the ivory beads in the photo above. So detailed. I'm glad I made a nice sized cane of that mix to use later.

Here is the necklace, bracelet and earrings I made with a few beads left over. The only beads I did not make in this set were the tiny wooden beads I used for spacers. They compliment the jade and ivory so well.

My new batch of jade uses tinted translucent clay and embossing power for the depth.

Sweets Overload

Just spent the day making miniature sweets to use for my granddaughters to give away to their friends for Christmas. Itty bitty teany tiny charms. I made pancakes with butter and syrup, a chocolate donut, peas, carrots, pumpkins, tomatoes, suckers, chocolates, snow cones and a big hand full of candy corn. I also made a tiny pitcher using the play dough flower cane for decoration.

I then made ivory/bone beads and faux jade beads. When I did the faux jade I used Pearl Ex to tint the translucent clay. The neat thing is that when the light hits the beads just right they have the green shimmer from the Pearl Ex. I used some left overs to do a natasha bead focal bead with the ivory.bone mix and jade caps.

I also used gold clay to get that fascinating mica shift by using a tiny ribbon of violet clay and then clop and flip to get the shine and veins. Wow did all of these turn out great.


I took pics of the candy corn as I made them to use for a tutorial which I will post soon. So easy and so cute.

I will post the pics of the other treats this week I hope.

Play Dough Technique Works!!!

Experiments are over and the technique works.

I printed out the pdf work sheet as the video takes forever to load, even with broadband DSL:


http://www.artbyyonat.polyclayplay.com/PlayDohVideo/PlayDohVideo.html



Holy cow. I didn't want to waste clay in case it didn't so I made a basic flower cane and added leaf sections.







I let it sit a minute while I found my grand kids play dough. I chose a pale yellow, also just in case, and did as the instructions say. A thin sheet about the medium setting on the pasta machine and cover the cane.






I thought it would spread and create gaps that the polymer clay would get through to the main cane but it didn't.

It almost creates a water soluble layer that protects the pc. I reduced it down and sliced to see that the flower still held it's shape.

I then pealed the waste clay off like pealing an orange and it came right away. The flower was very tiny.

I got a bowl of cold water to sit it all in to dissolve the play dough. This way using the small brush would not hurt the clay. I rinsed them off and changed the water twice to make sure and now I have a TINY flower cane that I can take slices off.



I used the cold water so the cold temp would keep the temp of the cane cool as it was warm in the house. All the play dough dissolved away. I added the scrap clay to the water so I could get the play dough off it to use again.

As a side note: If you get a call, just after you just added the play dough layer, to get over to your mothers house and call the ambulance make sure you have an air tight container nearby to place the cane in as play dough drys out fast. I sat my cane up where the cat could not get to it and forgot about the drying of the play dough so later I had to soak it in cold water to soften and then dissolve the play dough to add a new fresh layer. Did not hurt the PC and mom is doing much better.