Clay Play Time and Some New Snaps

My friend Joanne stopped by yesterday and we decided to play with our clay and experiment more with some of the techniques we learned in Bettina Welker's workshop.  We had fun trying out some new color combinations and then made some of the designs into snaps for our interchangeable jewelry.

The maple leaf snap shown below was made by Joanne.  I just love how the colors came out and is so perfect for autumn!

For the larger (maple leaf and heart) snaps we mounted them on the blank flat snaps.  They work really well on snap bases that are plainer such as the simple snap pendant or some new lapel pins that just arrived!

When Life Gives You Ribbons...

Make a hat!  I just finished making a bunch more clay dress and hat charms for our Sweater brooch pins.  Most of them were made to fill a special order for Chum N' Luba's Unique Boutique in our town of Chase.  There is a story about how the clay hats came to be.  A while ago I ordered a variety of metal base charms in a hat, shoe and purse theme.  When our order arrived I was a little disappointed to find these ribbon charms instead of the hats.  I tucked them away in a drawer not really knowing what to do with them but thinking they might come in handy some day.

Months later, I pulled out all of our metal charm findings to look for something in particular when I came across the ribbons again.  I could suddenly visualize them made into a hat by filling in the parts with clay.  So my "ADD" kicked in at that moment and completely forgetting what I was looking for, I had to try and make a clay hat charm.   I used a piece of vinyl placemat to create the woven texture.

And here are some more clay dress charms in a few new colors.

Folded Bead Sweater Shawl Pin

Here are some more sweater pins in a different style that were inspired by Helen Breil's Folded Bead tutorial.   The pieces are textured on the front and back and the textures used in the first two  pieces are by Helen Breil as well.  I show how to make the matching clay bead dangle in my latest tutorial, Constructing Accent Pieces for Your Scarves, Sweaters & Shawls.

  

For this piece I used Wendy Orlowski's texture called "Feather Boa".

These are a few of my prototypes and I have a few more ideas that I am playing around with.

Ladies Hat and Dress Brooch Pins

We had a nice time in Sicamous last Saturday at the Classic Car Show & Shine.  The weather was nice and warm and was perfect for enjoying the outdoors and viewing all the fabulous cars on display.  I managed to capture a few photos of some of my favorites.  Dave said I took some pictures of a few of his as well, although we had to take turns so that one of us was at our booth in the craft fair all the time.

This was my favorite car with the matching camping trailer.  I loved all the cool details right down to the cabinets in the back.

Along with the sweater guards in our display, our ladies hat and dress brooch pins were also a big attraction.

I had come across these little clothes hanger charms and decided a little dress had to go on them and they were then added to the kilt brooch pins.

Ladies in Red

It has been an extremely busy month but looks like things are quickly getting back to normal.  We have  mainly been filling store orders as this is a busy time of year for them which, of course, is good for us.

For the past year and especially during this Christmas season, we have had more jewelry requests in the color red.  We rarely make the same item in the same color combination more than once but we have repeated certain designs (in limited amounts) due to customer requests and popularity.

Here are some of our creations in this seasonal jewel-tone color.

Other than it being Christmas, there is another reason the color red has been so popular.  Many of you have heard of the Red Hat Society.  Well there is another group of ladies called the "Crown Jewels of Canada" (CJC).  I had the opportunity to meet with some of the ladies who are members of the CJC and after learning more about the group, I felt inspired to make more items in red.

We had bought some kilt brooch pins some time ago hoping to make some sweater pins with them.  These ones shown here as well as other styles and colors are now available at Donna's Yarn & Craft (north shore Kamloops) and will also be listed in our online shop soon.

More Butterflies and Owls

There has been a big demand lately for items with butterflies and owls.  These are more butterflies this time  made into shawl sticks.

And here are more owls made into shawl sticks as well.

Whenever I make a new item such as these owls, I like to take a photo showing basic construction.

I then print it out on an index card with more instructions such as clay thickness, clay color recipes used, etc.  I then keep it in this mini album that sits on my desk for a quick reference guide.  It is important that I do this and not just trust my memory for when I need to make more.

Here are more owls that I made using Judy Belcher's Knitting technique on CraftArtEdu.

My friend, Cynthia Blanton, lives miles away at the other end of the country, but thanks to the internet and e-mails, we feel much closer.  We seem to have a lot of similar interests -- at least where polymer clay comes in.  She has been playing with Judy Belcher's tutorial as well and you can see some cool items she has made on her blog as well as her Artfire Studio.  I love her "knit" sweater which would pair quite nicely with my knit socks.

I should mention that all of the above items (except Cynthia's adorable sweater of course) are now available at The Falkland General Store.  This is a real gem with lots of great supplies and gift type items for the knitter or anyone else who just enjoys cool stuff!

Faux Knitting Techniques

I've been playing around with Judy Belcher's tutorial, Polymer Micro Knitting.  I love how she worked out how to replicate 21 different knitting stitches in polymer clay.  She starts with the very basic stitches and then combines them in various ways to create more advanced ones.  Her lesson is pretty clear and easy to follow.  The Missoni inspired stitches remind me of the Bargello but with texture.

Here are a few items I made using this tutorial which have been a big hit with the yarn shops.  You can see a list of all the stores that sell our handcrafted items on our website.

Who Gives a Hoot!

Apparently a lot of our customers do.  I know I haven't blogged in a while again.  We have been up to our eyeballs with orders to fill so back into high production mode.  You've probably noticed owls popping up everywhere as they seem to be quite popular these days.  We've had requests for more owl themed items so these are a few more styles we have come up with.  To make things more streamlined and productive, I find it best to create all the owl faces in a sort of assembly line fashion.  Each one is individually formed from our own mold.  Genuine Swarovski crystals are embedded into the clay for the eyes and then they are each colored with mica powder pigments.

The cool thing about this method is that after they are baked, some of these will be made into buttons and others made into ...... some fun eyeglass holders.  We attached a brooch with bail on the back so it can be pinned or hung on a cord as a necklace.

These little guys will also be made into buttons and others turned into some lapel pins.

Between all the claying, we have been tidying up and reorganizing the studio.  I will share some of the new changes soon when it is all finished.

Owl Pins

I've noticed owls popping up everywhere lately.  After playing around with making my new birdie beads I decided to create some owls as well.  I made these ones into lapel pins.