Merry White Christmas

We are having a White Christmas.... just enough snow to make everything look pretty.

Taken from the back porch

Corny checking out the snow

Taste test

My blue and brown tree fell over

It's fine now, Roger fixed it for me.

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas!!

My Funny Bunnies Polymer Clay & Wire

I fully intended to decorate more ornaments but I got sidetracked with my Funny Bunnies.... they are more fun and don't give me fits .... I'll try ornaments again later.... maybe.

For the bunnies I make the wire frames first and then back them with clay.  Parawire had a new color of wire, Rose Gold, that is the primary color for the first bunny.

Click on the photos for a closer look.

Here he is before I added the clay background.

Once I added the clay I took his picture with some of my clowns, isn't he a cutie?

Here is a close up

I used copper and orange wire for the second Funny Bunny 

and then used clay scraps from the first bunny to swirl the background. I painted him with PearlEx to get the shine.

Next I made a floppy eared bunny. This time I used brown and magenta wire. 

I haven't backed him yet.... I know he looks a little chilly but he will have to remain naked until after I bake my Christmas cookie. I have my dough chilling in the fridge. I hope to get some of them baked this evening. 

See ya later.

My Attempt at Christmas Ornaments

It's a rather pathetic attempt, so far I've manage to finish three.

One of the gals over on Polymer Clay Central made bunches of beautiful glass ornaments decorated with polymer clay.  "Looks like fun" says I, "I think I'll give it a try.".   So I bundle up and head over to WalMart. Walmart is now the only place in town to buy things including  ornaments, they ran all the other stores out of town, even the dollar store couldn't compete...but I digress I was talking ornaments.  And of course they did not have any glass ornaments, only "shatterproof" plastic.  Boooooo!! I really miss Ben Franklin, they closed not long after WalMart came to town but I still miss them.

Next day Heather, Roger and I went to Michaels over in Edwardsville, I needed some clay supplies and while we were there I found some gold and brown glass ornaments.... and they were on sale... perfect, now I could  slap clay on them to my hearts content.  Speaking of sales, have you ever noticed half of Micheals inventory is always on sale.... you think they see us coming?  Plus I had my 50% off coupon which I always forget to use.

Later that evening, after I got hubby off to work, I whistled a happy tune as I laid out my supplies, got out the clay and started mixing colors. I made some stripes, I made some flowers, I cut some stars , I cleaned the first ornament and with much anticipation I placed the first line of clay on the glass.... huh.... it would not stick.... nope, not sticking at all. It stuck to my fingers, it stuck to the acrylic rod, it even stuck to the parchment paper but not to the glass.  After much smoothing and rolling .... and swearing... I finally got it to stick... the back of my fingernail worked the best, I've pretty sure the swearing helped too.  Here are the results so far.

Click on the photos for a closer look.

I had almost as much fun trying to get photos as I did making these blasted things!! Shiny ornaments have lots of glare... grrrrrr!

I used Kato clay for these and I anchored the tendrils with Kato liquid clay. Next time I will try Premo and Fimo Classic... oh, and I will try Pardo Art Clay, maybe it will stick better. 

Mixed Media Hearts and Things

I just this minute finished my Christmas shopping, I love the internet!!  We had our first snow last night, woke up to a glistening snow covered world, very pretty but also very cold so I was happy to do my shopping in front of the computer.

My tree is up, not decorated but it is sitting in the living room waiting to be adorned with twinkling lights and pretty ornaments.  I am trying something new this year, I'm doing the tree in blues and browns to match my living room.  I'm  little nervous, my eldest grandson is big on tradition,  I'm not sure how he will react to the change, he likes things to be the same at Grandma's house.

Here are some of the wire and polymer clay things I've been working one.

Wire hearts before I added the clay

Click on the photos for a closer look.

and here they are after I backed them with polymer clay

Here is another of my wire critters before the clay

and now with the clay backing

and I also made some wire "cage" pendants.  I will  add clay accents later. 

This one is my favorite

and this was just for fun... a wire "zentangle" inspired by the amazing zentangles by Ruth and Dora on their Flickr pages. 

I am going to go decorate the tree. See ya later!

Christmas Pin

Okay, I am not doing good keeping up with my blog!  The faster I go the behinder I get... did you all know that Christmas is in 3 weeks... how the hell did that happen?

I have been working my little heart out making the ornaments for the Mini Christmas Ornament Swap and I am happy to announce I am  done...well almost done, I still need to sew them on cards, put them in plastic bags and mail them.... which is taking almost as much time as making them.  I know what you're thinking... "why is the dummy sewing them on cards?"  right?,   see, I knew you were thinking that.   And the answer is because I put a lot of time and energy into making them and I don't want them to get broken or smushed plus they look nice on the cards.  I'll show them to you when the swap is over.


 I also made a Christmas pin with the scraps, that I can show you. Here it is.  Click on the photo for a closer look.

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and here is the back... as you can see it doesn't have a pinback yet... another thing on my "to do " list.

Here is the striped cane I used on some of the ornaments, the little cane on the left is made from scraps.

I am now going to go sew ornaments of cards.... see you later.

Works in Progress Owls & More

I made several more wire pieces that will become either pendants or brooches. 

Click on the photos for a closer look.

I will add a pin back to this little guy. I made the wire owl first then pressed it onto a textured polymer clay sheet that I highlighted with PearlEx powders. I used an Exacto knife to trim off the excess clay. After curing I usually seal PearlEx pieces with liquid Kato but this time I used Future. 

This one is fairly big, it measures 2 1/2"x 3 1/2" across.  This was made in two sections which I secured together with glue and wire. My muse and I are still trying to decide how to finish the necklace.... maybe with copper chain, cords or  beads or a combination of materials.  

This is just a funky doodad, not sure how I will use it. I am tempted to try and sell some of my wire doodads as decorations for hats, purses, belts hair clips etc.  

The vintage 40's plastic button was the inspiration for this one, it is a pretty peach that goes well with the orange beads and amber wire. I used light amethyst wire for contrast. I used 28 gauge wire over 18 gauge wire, it has a tighter weave than the ones I made with 26 gauge wire..... I like the look so I ordered more 28 gauge wire from Parawire.  I am such an impulse buyer, I can't resist shiny objects so I had to have every color.

This one is made with brown wire, yellow glass square beads and a couple butterscotch buttons from the 40's.  It will be a brooch as soon as I figure out how to attach the pinback. 

I will be doing turkey day things the next few days,  if I don't have time to post again before thursday I wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving 

Wire Jewelry & Polymer Clay Beads

It's been a while since my last post, I've had a cold plus we took advantage of the warm Indian summer weather and cleaned out the garage.  It was crammed full of stuff and the squirrels had a field day with the stuffing in the old couch and the boxes of magazines and books.  For little critters  they sure can do a  lot of damage. The garage is looking pretty good. There are still several pieces of furniture that will go to auction.  Once it's done Roger will have a place to store his vintage Mustang and his motor cycle. 

I've been mostly working with wire. I made lots of doodads and some necklaces. Here are three necklaces that I finished.

Click on the photos for a closer look.

The first one is made with blue and gun metal grey wire and blue square beads. It's quite large but I like it. 

The second is my favorite. I use 18 gauge amber wire to create the design and then wove in amber,  brown and bronze 26 gauge wire. The center is a metal button set with pearly gold stones. I made a coiled wire bail and strung the pendant of jasper beads and used brown glass seed beads for spacers. 

The third is gold and sea green wire set with a vintage celluloid button that I've had lying around for a very long time.  The button is missing a couple rhinestones but  it still looks pretty good and the "well loved" look is in right now. There is a little dragonfly bead on the wire.  The chain is made from matching wire.

I used one of the pretty coasters I got in the coaster swap as a background for this large wire bow doodad.   I like the way it looks on the coaster so I am going make a large tile to mount it on and make it into a large medallion style pendant.  According to the experts large is in.  I am going to do the same with more of my wire pieces.

This pendant has a wire frame with a polymer clay center.  Heather thinks granddaughter Amanda might like this one.

Plaid polymer clay framed with amber and sea green wire. 

The last couple months I have been using only Pardo Art Clay but since it doesn't come in metallics I got out my Kato clay to make these textured beads.  The difference in conditioning is quite striking, I had to get out my hammer and pound the clay before I used the pasta machine.  I still like Kato, it doesn't change color while curing, but oh the smell!  The Art Clay doesn't smell at all but Kato sure does.  I've always been a little allergic to it and it did make my eyes itch and my nose run.  

I mixed silver and blue to get the color for these beads. The design is the same on both sides. 

I added a little red to gold Kato for these beads. The design is on both sides.

I made more wire things but I want to mount them on polymer clay before I take photos. I'm working on an owl necklace that I really like.  I hope to get it done today so I can show it to you.

Thanks for stopping by.