Scrap Paper Mother's Day Card DIY- Mother's Day 2012 - How Tuseday!

I found some great DIY instructions for beautiful handcrafted Mother's Day cards around the web last night. Here are three of them you should check out:

Quilted Mother's Day Greeting Cards from A Beautiful Mess Blog

Make Your Own Mother's Day Card from Duni's Studio

Make It : Mother's Day Robin Card with Rosa Clifford

Mother's Day is Sunday! So I thought I would  also share a quick how-to for making a Mother's Day card with scrap paper. I used some spare scrapbook paper that I had, and a 5x7 (A7) blank greeting card. You can find blank greeting cards at many local big-name stores, and online also. You could also use blank card stock paper if you have it around your home!

Here's what I did, and the supplies I used:

In case you can't read the text on the pictures (the text is smaller than I thought), here are the steps:

Supplies: Blank Greeting Card or Card stock, Glue/Sealant, Paint, Pen, Your favorite quote or Poem, Scrap Paper ( I used Scrapbook paper), Paint Brush.

1. Draw a pattern on the blank card, and add colored paint of your choice (I used acrylic paint).
    Then paint over this with white paint before the colored paint has completely dried.

2. Write a quote or poem of your choice over the paint.
    Then lightly paint over the written text with white paint also.

3. Lay out the scrap paper in whatever pattern that you like.
    Seal it on the greeting card with glue or glaze. I used Inkssentials Glossy Accents.

Have a great Tuesday! If you have found any great how-to's today, or have one of your own, share them in the comments section of this post. I would love to check them out.

Polymer Clay Garden Markers - How To-sday

This week to go along with my Backyard theme, I decided to make some garden markers for our plants we just got. I found a great tutorial on making garden markers with old silverware, and thought that I could make my own version with clay.

I also tried making a garden marker with an old spoon we had, using some Vintaj Patina, but stamping a word on it didn't turn out so great. The Patina looks nice though.

Antique Spoon Plant Markers is the tutorial I found, so check it out!

For my garden markers, I got some different colors of polymer clay, some letter stamps, acrylic paint, pearl-ex powder, and basic clay tools.

I rolled out the clay using an acrylic roller instead of clay/pasta machine so that the clay would be thicker. And then I cut the slabs of clay into the shapes I wanted.

Then I used the letter stamps to spell out the names of the plants that I got on Sunday. And started to add acrylic paint with my fingertips.

Finally, I added some Pearl-ex powder, also with my fingertips. (Pretty messy but still fun)

I still have to bake these markers, but here are a few I made last night and finished. I hand drilled holes in some, and added wire to help them stick out of the soil some.

And here they are in the flower pots that we already had in our backyard:

Have a great Tuesday! If you have any tips on making gardent/plant markers, let me know. The rest of the week I will be posting Etsy themed backyard listings, and a before and after of my backyard.

Friday Fun and Feature - Artchix Studio Easter Pendant

TGIF! Yesterday my daughter had fun making some art, so today it was my turn! First: Here's a picture of her art project, and one of our cats decided to check it out when she was done.

And April Fool's Day is this Weekend! Here are some items on Etsy I found for the occasion.

Boyfriend In a Bottle

Denture Soap Gag Gift

1001 Riddles - Vintage 1949

Funny Sign - Survivors

Now on to the fun! I love Artchix Studio. Their site has so many great art supplies like collage sheets, beads and charms, ATC supplies, paper dolls, vintage goods, and wood shapes. On top of that, their site has an inspiration page, classes, and art swaps!

Artchix Studio is also on Facebook, has a wonderful blog, and Helga of Artchix now has an Etsy site.

A few months ago I bought some goody bags from Artchix Studio. I made a few gifts with what I got, but now that my daughter is a little older ( she just turned 17 months!), I have a bit more time to create. So today I will show you just one of many things you can do with Artchix Studio's great products.

Using the Wood Mix Goody Bag, I picked out a single hole round wood tag. Then I picked out some scrapbook paper that I have been saving, some acrylic paint, and some glue/sealer. Also, I decided to turn this into a pendant, so I grabbed some silver wire, wire cutters, scissors, and some scrap suede cord.

Here are some of the great wood pieces I got in the goody bag

 

You can use anything that you want to add to these great tags, that's the fun of creating!

This project took me maybe 15 minutes once I got all of the materials together.

Easter is next weekend, and my daughter is going to have her first Easter egg hunt, so I decided to make this necklace Easter themed, and I will hide it in an egg for her.

First I added some acrylic paint to the round tag; first some cream colored paint, then a bit of color until I liked how it looked. Then I covered the back of the tag with more cream paint, and let both sides dry. 

I used some glue on the back of the scrapbook paper that I cut out, and attached the bunny face to the front of my pendant. I decided to quickly add a Swarovski crystal to this side after I covered it with the same flue to seal it. Once the front side dried again, and did the same to the back, but added some hand writing.

Finally, I added the wire and suede cord! Super easy, fun, and relaxing. 

So, check out Artchix Studio and grab some supplies of your own to create with!

Thank you for reading today, and have a great weekend!

One other thing: Since it is April Fool's Weekend, here is a discount code for The Clay Geek Etsy site just for reading my blog! The code will be valid through Monday. 

Enter this: FOOLDAY1 

 at checkout for 15% off of anything in my shop!

Using Waterslide Transfer Paper with Polymer Clay - Make It Monday

Good Morning! It's Monday, and I thought it would be fun to show you how you can use waterslide transfer paper with polymer clay. I have used this product for a while now in my art work, and just started using it to transfer copies of my drawings. Here are some basic tools that you will need:

White, Translucent, or light colored Polymer Clay

Clay Pasta Machine

Clay Blade

Convection oven used just for Clay

Blank Waterslide Transfer Inkjet Paper Pack , or a set that already has images

Liquid Polymer Clay ( I use translucent Liquid Sculpey)

Water (In a spray bottle or with some q-tips)

Paint Brush you don't mind messing up

Scissors 

Something to bake on: I use a white ceramic tile, and wax paper.

I use the Blank Waterslide Transfer Paper (created by Lisa Pavelka) to print my own images.I also used the pasta machine to roll out a gumball sized piece of translucent polymer clay. For this project, I rolled it on the thinnest setting, which is different depending on your machine. Mine is size 9. Also before starting, I make sure to turn my convection oven on to preheat.

Once I have the images, I begin by cutting them out. You will want to leave a small blank edge around your image so that it will adhere to the clay better.

Next, I put the images face down onto the rolled out polymer clay. I also press the images down into the clay with my fingers (not enough to dent the clay).

Once all of the images that I want to bake are on the clay, I used my mist bottle, filled with water, and sprayed the entire piece of clay with the images. If you don't have a mist bottle, you could use water with a q-tip to cover the images. Using enough water and waiting 30-60 seconds, you will begin to see them images through the paper backing.

If you plan to only bake one image, or want to use the image as a pair of earrings, you might want to cut around the image using a clay blade before taking the paper backing off with water. Still make sure to leave enough clay around the edge of the image to use it how you would like, and so the image wont peel up during baking!

Then, you can start gently sliding the paper right off of the clay and image(s).

Once you have all of the paper backing off of the clay, it's time to use the liquid polymer clay, and a paint brush. I use my paint brush to spread the liquid clay evenly over all of the images. If there is any water left on your clay, make sure to gently dab it up with a paper towel or your finger before adding the liquid clay.

Once the clay is completely covered, it will look like this, and be ready to bake.

While this was baking for about 25 minutes, I worked on some other projects, and cleaned my work space!

Now that the clay is baked: Take it out to cool.

This is an additional step - not required - I decided to cut the smaller top half of the clay with my clay blade while it was still hot, to have it all fit in this small container (pictured below).  Before taking the clay out of the oven, I grabbed a tupperware container that I have used only for clay before, and filled it with cold water. Sometimes I also add ice cubes. I took the clay out of the oven, and instead of letting it cool off for a while, I dumped/submerged it into the water very quickly. This helps translucent clay cool more evenly, quickly, and sometimes helps you avoid possible "artifacts" in the clay that will make it less translucent.

Once the clay is cool, I cut around the images, again leaving some space around the edges. You will cut your images out differently depending on what you are going to use them as.
I will be using these small glasses images on some clay figures, so I don't need much clay around the edge of the image. If I were to use these as earrings, I might cut these into larger rectangles, and add a hole to one end for earring wires.

And there you have it! My image is now ready to use. And I can cut all of the images out so they are ready for future artwork. One more tip, when you use this transfer paper, you can not cut through the image once it is baked.

Here is another image that I baked, over one of my magnets. These pictures aren't the best, but you should be able to see the translucency here.

If you got through  reading my "how to", let me know what you think! Comment Below.
If you have any questions about using polymer clay, or want to see a "how to" using other polymer clay techniques, let me know also!

Remember to enter my giveaway (posted Friday), you have until Wednesday morning!