Trying a New Thing

Clay! Polymer clay. See that link under "Who I'm following" for MoeArt Polymer Clay Creations? That's my Aunt. She's a self-professed clay addict. But that's OK because she's very good at it. (And very funny so go read her blog!)

Aunty Em, being the generous soul she is, sent me a wonderful box containing everything I would need to try my hand at clay. I haven't touched any kind of moldable material since SillyPutty and the Play-Do Barbershop days but I was eager to get started.

One of the many things in the box was a large bag of clay scraps.



Perfect for practicing on without wasting any of the pretty, new, solid color bricks. So I rolled and kneaded and folded and smooshed and rolled and kneaded and... and made lots of gray.
I practiced rolling out snakes and had fun cranking clay out of the extruder and spent a great deal of time with the brayer trying to make a flat rectangle of the same thickness. Harder than it sounds. Harder than picking up the polymer clay lingo. ;)

After several hours (uhm ok, more like all day) I had a piece ready to bake. 45 minutes later plus a little cooling time, and I had this, a cuff bracelet made entirely from polymer clay. Mis-shapen and mangled in places, but a bracelet nonetheless.



How cool is that? From the above melange to a bracelet!

After I tried smoothing the edges with a disposable emery board (wrong!) I ended up with what, to a visually impaired person, could possibly pass as a worn leather cuff.

I then decided, what the heck, I'll paint it. So I dug into my drawer of acrylic craft paints and found a sheer metallic copper and a sheer metallic silver. Alrighty! Seemed like just the thing. An hour later I had this:



I couldn't get an accurate picture of it, one that didn't make it appear shinier/brighter or flatter/matte-er than it really is, but you get the idea. It looks like medium-aged penny with pewter accents.

Is it beautiful? Is it going to win awards and make people stop me on the street to ask where I got such a grand bracelet? Heck NO! But it's my first ever polymer clay piece so I am shamelessly showing it off here.

Many thanks and mahalos to Aunty M, and a special thanks to "Mary Kay Too" from the PCC forum who contributed items for my clay care-package. I now have another hobby I am going to love.