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South Western Clay Jewelry - craft tutorial.
How to make South Western Clay Jewelry
DIY - Archives
Easy South Western Jewelry using polymer clay.
Take a large concho and 2 smaller ones that match the larger one, and
remove the bar across the center.
Mix lt blue, white, and black clay together to make a marbleized
turqouise, then press thru the center of the conchos to make it look like
you have a turqouise stone there. Smooth the back of the clay onto the
metal of the concho, and bake. After it's cooled, you can glaze the clay
or not, and glue a pin back at one end on the large one and earring studs
to one end of each of the smaller ones. Now you have one set of western<
style jewelry.
More easy polymer clay jewelry, or use as Xmas tree decorations:
Roll out your clay, use cookie cutters for the occasion, and use rubber
stamps in the cut-outs that also go with the occasions.
Example: Xmas theme, like stars, and use star rubber stamps on the cut out.
Dust with colored powder. Or, use a heart cutter, and use a much smaller cutter
to make little heart cut-outs in the large one. Press these cut-outs on the
clay heart either above or below the cutout that they came from.
If making as a pin, glue pin back on after clay is baked and cooled. If
using as a tree decoration, or for a package decoration, make a hole
in the top part using a drinking straw. Press straw into clay, and
remove. There will be a hole that you will string your thread thru
to hang it.
Rainbow pin:
make snakes of the same size of these colors: purple, blue,
turquoise, green, yellow, orange, pink. Use the brightest colors you can
find, or mix your own before making the snakes. Fold the pink snake in
half, and lay on your work space. Place the orange snake next to it,
making the ends as close as possible [dont worry if they arent the same
length; you'll be trimming the ends]. Next place the yellow snake next to
the orange snake. Place the green snake next to the yellow snake. Place
the lt blue, or turquoise, snake next to the green. Place the blue one
next to that. The last one is the purple snake.
Make sure they look like a rainbow arch, and press lightly together to fuse.
Flatten gently, and cut off the ends with a sharp knife, making sure that some of
the pink is still on the rainbow, but cutting very closely to the center fold joint.
Do not smooth this cut area. Bake, and glaze if you want, and glue a pin
back or magnet on it.
If you want to hang something, like a small charm or even a funny face
you've made [I made small ones for my mom, with everyone's name written
on the collars, and hung them from hearts that she has on her wall],
then push in small eye pins into the clay before you've baked it, and do
the same with whatever you make to hang from the rainbow.
After it's baked, carefully remove the eye pin, put a drop of glue
[any kind] on the eye pin, and re-insert it carefully. After it's
dry, it'll never come out.
More jewelry ideas:
Use cookie cutters in half-moon shapes or star shapes, use gold clay,
dust with gold powder, press in star shaped brads into the clay and
bake. [you can also use eye shadow to give your items an unusual
sheen, or to give it a very light color]
You usually find the brads near the beads section, where you press these
onto clothing, and fold over the pointy things to hold them onto the
fabric. You can get these in gold or silver. Also, you can punch holes in
the clay, using a straw, but dont make the holes too close to the edges
or it'll break during wearing. After it's baked, put jump rings in the
holes and attach gold chains to each of the jump rings, so that the
chain is long and moves when the person walks.
If you use any of the powders, whether it's eye shadow or clay powder,
you'll have to glaze after it's baked, or the powder will rub off.
CJ R Colorado, USA
This is something that kids can do, with supervision.
Materials:
Box of paperclips
Clay, your choice brand, your choice color[s].
Work surface, like a hard platic sheet or kitchen tile [the tiles
are also ovenproof, so I use them]. Do not use your table unless
covered with something! Polymer clays have an oil that will damage
fine woods.
Hook paper clips together to form a necklace that will go over the
head of the person it's for, so that you won't have to put a clasp
on it.
Condition clay well, even if it feels soft right from the package.
You'll know it's conditioned when it's very pliable and almost feels
warm. If you mix 2 colors together to get another color, the time it
takes you to blend those colors is the correct amount of time to
condition clay.
Break off small portions of clay, roll into a ball and continue
rolling until all seams are gone. Press onto paper clips, pushing
some clay through to the other side, and then press these seams together
till they are gone. You should still be able to see the rounded ends of
the paper clips where they are hooked together. After all paper clips
have been covered, place a piece of paper, either typeing paper or
parchment paper, on the baking surface, place necklace on the paper so
that the clay 'beads' arent touching each other, and bake at the
time on the package for 15 to 20 minutes.
Do not over bake! After it's cooled, you can finish with a water based
glaze, or paint designs on the beads using acrylic clay, followed with
a water based glaze. Or, you can leave unglazed and unpainted for a stone
look. You can even polish a bit by using a piece of denim and rubbing the
beads.
Mix colors together to get different looks.
Example:
Different shades of pink. Different shades of blue. Blue, pink
and white. Red, white and blue. Lt blue, dk blue, black and white.
Shades of purple. Mix pearls with non-pearls. Metallics. If you want a
torqouise nugget look, mix blue with small amounts of white till you
get the shade you want [or mix in a bit of green if you like the green
torquoise], then after you have pressed your finished color onto the
paper clips, take a piece of foil, rumple into a ball, and press into
the clay, forming depressions. After it's baked, use black acrylic
paint watered down as a wash and brush on the nuggets. Wipe off the
paint almost immediately. The black will stay in the depressions, and
make your nugget look like it has real matrix in it.