EXPERIMENTING WITH POLYMER CLAY AND PEBEO -----AGAIN!

As you know I love these Pebeo paints.  The result is a surprise every time I use them.

My sweet dentist that I made the crosses for in the previous post loved the pendant I made his assistant and he asked if I would make one for his wife.  Of course I forgot to take a picture of the one I gave her.  I decided I wanted to do a test with polymer clay and Pebeo again and make his wife a pendant like the one I made my friend only smaller.

Sorry the background looks dirty but these are still wet and I didn't want to touch them or move them.  If you look at the large football shaped pendant in the middle (click on the picture), you will see squares of texture coming through the paint.  I made the polymer clay base by running my sheet of clay which was done on the pasta machine on number 1 which is the largest setting on my machine.  I ran the clay through again on the number 1 with a thin rubber texture sheet.  

I got this from Shades of Clay many years ago and haven't seen them any where since.  It goes through the pasta machine so easy.  I doubled the clay in half so each side would have the squares and circles texture on it.  Pressed it together and then cut out the pendant shapes.  Since the bottom was flatter after I baked it, I put the paint on the bottom.  When I put the paint on I used a toothpick, I thought I put it on pretty heavy.  When I looked an hour later, I could see the circle starting to show through.  I was kind of surprised but I really liked the effect.  Once the paint is dry, I'll put Magic Glos on to protect them.  I usually do one of coat of Magic Glos, sand the edges and back and buff them and then put another coat of Magic Glos on.  I don't know if the texture will show through the Magic Glos or not.  I'll take some pictures when I'm done.  

I'M NOT A HOARDER

BUT, I do find things that I bought and forgot about.

I was looking for something the other day and found some Secret Compartment Key Chains that I forgot I had.  So, I put some clay on them and they will go in my Etsy shop.  I love these things for keeping pills or toothpicks in.  I keep my migraine pills in one and hang it on my purse.

I've had a migraine all day and it's been a really bad one.  I was laying back in the recliner on the couch and Buster

Came up and laid on me for an hour so I guess I got my cat scan today.  Didn't help the headache but made me feel better.

POLYMER CLAY AND FRIENDS

Was there a life before polymer clay?  I still have friends that I stay in touch with that I went to high school with and friends that I worked with but I realized this morning that most of my close friends are ones that I've met because of our shared passion for polymer clay.  When I joined the Arizona Polymer Clay Guild I made friends that I absolutely cherish.  When I started teaching polymer clay at our beading club I made friends who are part of my daily life and I cherish all of them.  If it weren't for polymer clay, I wonder what I would be doing and who I would be hanging out with.  So, I'll tell you where this is leading.  About 6 months ago a woman joined out guild and we hit it off right from the get-go.  She is one of the most talented clay artists I've ever met and I just love her colors and unique things that she makes.  The fact that she has an incredible sense of humor is also what brought us together.  We have been supporting each other through some tough times the last couple months and she decided she needed to cheer me up and let me know how much she really cares.

These are the presents I got from her Saturday.  The thing in the middle is a card with a picture of a cat in a bag.  I've been laughing non stop every time I look at it.  I'm sure that's Buster's twin.  Check out the gorgeous pendants and the bead she made.  The bead was made from pieces of cane that she got from me in our cane swap.  I'm trying to figure out how I can wear all three at the same time.

 

She also gave me this incredible texture sheet.  You know there are going to be a lot of cat things made with this.  LOL

 

Please check out Michele's Etsy shop if you want to see some beautiful pieces.

 

http://www.etsy.com/shop/MichelesArtJewelry

 

Thanks again my dear Michele.  That card is sitting on my desk and it makes me smile non-stop.

 

SHALL I BEAD OR SHOULD I DO CLAY???????? HMMMMM

Yesterday I taught my friend Judy how to do Peyote Stitch.  She loves it.  I thought we would just practice a piece first BUT NO, she just wanted to jump right in.  I started her with the Bumps in the Road pattern and decided to do it with her so it would be easier for her to see.  Of course I couldn't let it sit there, I had to finish it.  This is the one I made, Judy's will be done soon and I'll post it.

In the meantime, I have all this new Premo clay calling my name.   The colors are incredible.  So, do I bead tonight or do I do clay or iron clothes?  I think I'll hide the ironing so that will be one less decision to make.

I bought some necklaces from a guy at a fair not too long ago.  They were all Chinese crystals.  He was selling them so cheap I had to buy a bunch.  Took them apart and put them on this bracelet.  I almost made a golf stroke counter out of these beads, glad I didn't.

The polymer beads were done with a Kaleidoscope Cane, all the spacer beads are the ones I bought and I can't even tell you how many I have.  Obsessive Compulsive when it comes to beads and clay.

Today my friend Judy and I went to Prescott and had a nice lunch.  I visited their snow and left it there.  We stopped at a little art shop that had wonderful things.  I have a bunch of these Colorbox Molding Mats but he had some I've never seen so those came home with me.

The top one is called Houndstooth Check and the bottom one is called Starry Swirls.  I'm going to have to build a room just for all my texture sheets and texture tools.

Another thing he carried in this store were these awesome clay shapers.  The black tipped one is huge and is a little harder than the gray tipped one.  He had every shape and every size.  I use my tiny ones all the time, I'm guessing these are going to be in the container marked "MY FAVORITE TOOLS" along with Christi Freisen's tools which I really love.  I put the golf ball there so you could see how big the shapers are not because I played golf at Torrey Pines.  I went there and bought two golf balls and a golf ball marker.  I'm not the Torrey Pines kind of golfer.  I'm the "oops, I think I hit another ball in the water" kind of golfer.  LOL

Back to work, found a 3 pound bag of beads in the back of the closet that I forgot I had.  Need to find a home for them.  I spilled about 2000 and some went in Booboo's bed so he's not a happy cat.

CLAY DAY IN ARIZONA

Today was a very special day for me.  My friends Judy, Rose and Evelyn came over for 6 hours and we played with clay.  We did take time for lunch but not much.  Evelyn made a shrimp salad, Judy brought the bread, Rose brought donuts and my husband made a buttermilk chess pie for us for desert.  I will probably have to borrow my husbands pants tomorrow after eating all that today.

Anyway,  I am lucky to have a big enough studio/office that four of us can fit into and do clay.  We like to share new techniques with each other.  Things that we've read about or seen on youtube.  We also share other things, like today, Rose ordered hollow acrylic rollers for all of us, Judy bought some brass stencil plates for us to use and Evelyn gave us all a package of texture sheets.  We usually meet at least once a month and everyone has an idea of what they would like to try.  Today, I showed them how to do what we call a Lynne cane.  They all came out different.  We also did another technique from a tutorial that I purchased from Rivervalley at http://www.claylessons.com/rivervalley.  It's really fun. 

This is the piece that Judy made.

This was the raw clay it was made from.

This is the piece Evelyn made.

This is the raw clay it was made from.

This is the raw clay that Rose made and I forgot to take a picture of her finished piece.

These are my finished pieces that I did yesterday and again tryng to use the stamp pads to give things color.  Won't do that on baked clay again as you can see by the piece with the blue on it.

GIRLFRIENDS

They told me today that I could post their pictures so here they are.

This is Judy, she just started doing clay about 8 months ago and she's hooked.  YIPEE.  As you can see from the photos above, Judy is quite talented.

This is Rose, she's sweet and cute and makes us laugh and she does great clay.

Last but not least is Evelyn.  She's our green and brown and gold girl.  She's also our cook and baker and people are in awe when they see her pendants.  Someone asked me yesterday what kind of stone she used when making a necklace and I told them it was "Polymer".  They were stunned.

OK, this has been a long blog, sorry, I'm still wound up and the funny thing is Booboo spent the whole day in the studio with us and he slept right through it.