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Helen, from our clay guild, took a few of us down to Waliga’s in Johnston, RI on Tuesday. It’s this great big warehouse filled with all kinds of jewelery merchandise, everything from high end overstock to ancient corroded chains to engraved glass poodle pendants. (I was tempted but I went for a brass elephant instead) Some of it’s newer stuff but a lot of it is older job lots or from places that went out of business - things you may never see anywhere else.

You do need a resale license and they do have a miniumum but it was such a treat to wander around poking in boxes and the shelves upon shelves upon shelves. I got some lovely textured brass chains which have deep gold and slightly reddish and purply patinas to them. I’m thinking if I ever make anything with the bronze clay, they’ll be perfect.

I also got a couple pounds of old Czech crystals. I just couldn’t resist the sparklies Now I have to figure out what I want to do with them. Here’s an example of some similar ones from ebay.

First of all, I am still alive. I’ve just been busy and I’m still conflicted over exactly what this blog should be. Most of my posts so far have been polymer clay, or kaleidoscope, or at least art related. I haven’t been doing much, if any art in the past few months so I haven’t really had anything to post.

Bead and Button did have the Bead Dreams finalists (including my flying squirrel) included in their latest issue so make sure you check it out if you have it. I think the colors were a little off in the photos but there were some cool pieces.

We had the Connecticut guild’s Clay ConneCTion in July. It was a lot of fun but I have to admit I haven’t even unpacked my pasta machine since then. Terrible, isn’t it? I still want to try hitting Tyvek with a heat gun like I saw in one of the demos. It has some interesting possibilities and it’s so light weight. And someone conveniently has an online lesson to the tyvek technique.

So what have I been doing and what am I going to post about? Well, I think I’m going to widen the blog to anything creative. When there’s nothing else going on, that may include talking about my cat-who would be able to open the door if he only had that pesky opposable thumb, but I’ll play it by ear.

I can’t believe I almost forgot to blog about this… My Flying Squirrel was juried in to the 2008 Bead Dreams competition! I can’t wait to see who else made it in.

Libby posted some pictures of the bracelets from her workshop - you can see mine with the black and white flowers in the upper left.

And in other news, I’ve ordered a kiln! I’m going for a Paragon SC3 with the bead door and view window options. (Nothing like overkill and covering for anything I might ever want to do!) My husband, awesome man that he is, got some extra money from an insurance claim and offered to get it for me. I think the main use will be PMC but I’ve also ordered some glass fusing and enameling books from the library, and I’ll use it for annealing beads if I get into lampworking. I think I’m going to have fun with it.

I have alot of great mental images of things I can make, the hard part will be getting my skill levels up to match

I went to the Weekend of Clay sponsored by the Southern Connecticut Polymer Clay Guild this past weekend. It was ALOT of fun. Basically there are 4 three-hour workshops taught by guild members and the whole weekend is nothing but clay. And a few snacks and chocolate Which reminds me I need to post my Texas Cavier salsa recipe…

The first workshop was on Retro Canes (extruded canes from the clay gun). I’d seen the concept before but Jenn Dorian had some really great variations and twists.

Libby taught us how to make a beaded caterpillar bracelet in black and white - it was the first time I’d done something more complicated with seed beads than just stringing them. Knotting the beading thread after every few fringes drove me nuts (partly because I’d made some dimensional flower beads and the thread kept getting caught on the petals) but I’m really pleased with how my bracelet turned out.

Sunday morning, I showed everyone how to sculpt a treefrog. Everyone made their own frog with their own unique style and twists. Each one was done in different colors or with different expressions. Loreen even made a “Klimt” frog by covering it with a square Retro cane.

The last session was on modifying faces from face molds. Tricia Hamel showed us her variations and gave us suggestions on surface effects and embellishments. I really liked how she mixed Pearl-ex with TLS to make it more manageable and a bit more subtle.

All in all it was a really great weekend and it got me inspired to try a few new things. Classes or retreats really can get your enthusiasm recharged.

I enjoyed the following excerpt from an article about a miniature show. We all say, “I could do that” when we look at things, even if it’s silently in our heads. You never realize how involved something is until you actually try it.

Donna Henricks, who will teach a wicker furniture workshop, has made miniatures for more than 30 years.

“People can’t believe that you make it,” Henricks said.

During one show, a woman approached Henricks to ask about her flowers created from polymer clay. When Henricks told her the price, she decided it was too steep and instead bought supplies to make them herself.

“She was at the table the next morning and said, ‘I was up all night,’ ” Henricks said. “She couldn’t begin to make anything that looked like a flower. Until someone experiences trying to do it they really don’t realize. They think they’re kid toys, so why are they so expensive? They’re really adult collector pieces.”

I came across this article on an exhibition of two artists who use polymer clay

Check out the exhibit website where you can see a couple images of the work - looks rather interesting if a little off the wall

…
Big meets small in “Not to Scale,” an exhibit featuring the work of Luber and Peebles currently on display at the Saratoga County Arts Council gallery, 320 Broadway in Saratoga Springs. The show runs through March 1.
…
Peering through microbinocular lenses, sculptor Peter Luber creates complicated works of art within the confining glass walls of vacuum tubes.

Matthew Peebles sculpts 3-dimensional comic figures, including a life-size image of a man with a painfully inflated head.

So what do you do when you’re too tired to clay and everything’s turning to mush on you?

I’m going to be teaching a 4 hour workshop on sculpting tree frogs for my guild in March. So.. I’m working on a couple frog sculptures as class examples. I have some cute ones and wanted something a little more realistic to show some variation.

The first step was to make a base. I chose a nice chunk of shale (layered black rock) that I picked up on the beach as the main support. Then I used some marbled green scrap and alot of texturing to make “moss” growing on the rock. A skewer and some floral wire provided a nice armature for two tropical leaves and I now had a plant growing on my rock.

I baked the clay directly on the rock so it would conform in shape, than added a bit of detail with some acrylic washes and drybrushing on the moss. A little alcohol based ink added a sheen and some depth to the leaves. It all looked great. (I’ll try to post pics at some point)

Then I started on the frog… And it just wasn’t working. The little guy looked cute but he didn’t have the right expression, and he didn’t fit the leaf base - he was both too big and not quite the right style. About that point I realized I was tired, frustrated and I’d gone too long without eating. SO I went off to get a snack and then I watched tv for a couple hours.

I ended up making a new vertical leaf stalk the next day that matched the existing frog and it looks pretty good. Not quite what I was going for but I like it. And I still have the original base to make a smaller frog for…

I’m not sure if there’s a moral to this story, but I’m going to make sure I take a break next time BEFORE I’ve gone past the crash point. And if I’m too tired for intense concentration, I’ll work on something less demanding - like sanding. I hate sanding, but that’s another story!

You have to like a group with a name like that. I came across them because of an article on the snow sculpture they do. It’s interesting that they use a polymer clay model to plan their three ton snow sculptures ahead of time.

A few more blogs to check out:

Polymer Clay Daily - I know I’ve mentioned this before but its the place to go if you want to see what other artists are up to. For example, this recent post highlighted an artist I hadn’t come across before.

Polymer Clay Notes - I have no idea how she finds time to blog so prolifically but it’s well worth stopping by. Artists, inspiration and more… Check out this post featuring an artist who does micro mosaics - not clay but it could be.

Polymer Clay Review - Polymer clay related product and book reviews. Looks like there’s another kind of transfer paper that I hadn’t seen before.