Cactus Flowers, Bunny Rabbits, Tartans and Butterflies

What a weekend!  It has been some kind of roller coaster ride the last 4 days.  Thursday night, I started on a custom order for a local customer who wanted some Scottish Tartan pendants and brooches for her gift shop.  I made a few on spec for her to see, and when I tried to email photos to her, I found out my email account had been hacked.  I went through the steps to try to recover it, but in the end, the account was closed, so I spent almost all day Saturday trying to remember all the accounts so I could get everything updated. 

Everything went smoothly until I tried to update my Nook e-readers.  I have the 1st edition and the color edition.   The 1st edition runs on 3G cellphone service.  The color runs on wi-fi, which I cannot access in the rural area where I live.  If I want wi-fi on the weekends, I have to drive 25 miles to the nearest McDonald's parking lot. 

 

 

Getting ahold of someone in B&N's customer service department took 2 hours.  I got disconnected several times, and was so frustrated, I wanted to throw the Nook at the wall.   When I finally connected with a real, live person, I was told I needed a wi-fi connection to "unregister" my color Nook.  The techie person wasn't sure if I could "unregister" the 1st edition without messing up the color, and vice versa.   He also said I would lose my library, but I could download them again... all 938 books, one at a time.   I told him to forget it, I'd just go buy a Kindle and start over again.   Amazon still has a reader that works on 3G.  My 1st edition Nook is obsolete and they don't sell it, nor do they offer another 3G reader.  That's all I had to say to get him to check further to see if there was anything I could do to save my library.  It all worked out in the end, and I actually had some time to create some new pieces, too.

The new Scottish Tartan pieces I created on spec for a local gift shop: L-R:   Royal Stewart Earrings, Wallace Brooch, Ayrshire Scotland Necklace, Crawford Brooch, Sullivan Necklace, Campbell Necklace, MacLean Necklace, Baxter Necklace, Davidson Necklace

These pieces are part of my Spring 2012 Collection.  The 3 brooches in a row are a custom order for my friend, Lucia. 

And finally, these pieces were created using scrap clay and my "controlled marbling" technique (tutorial coming soon.)

The first thing I thought of when I saw the green and turquoise colors in the mix was "cactus flowers,"  so these became part of my Southwestern Landscapes Series.  I love making these little heart earrings, but they are the devil to sand and buff!

And if you're wondering why all the mosics all of a sudden, it's because making them is easier than figuring out how to line up two photos beside each other in this new blogspot format.   If you would like to check out better photos, please visit my flickr photostream. 

Pardo Experiments

Cynthia Tinapple's post today at Polymer Clay Daily was about playing with clay, appropriate for me since playing with the clay with no set goal is one of the things that helped me work my way out of my 3 month long polymer slump.  Cynthia played with a crocheted, "granny square" look for polymer, with fabulous results.   Me?  I played with Pardo. 

I experimented with Premo Translucent and Premo Frost last year in an effort to duplicate beach glass, and now it seems all the rage to be trying to duplicate beach glass.  Pardo has lead the way as far as the most realistic efforts, so I thought I'd get some and see how I could wreck it, er, I mean, see what I could do with it.

One of the things I love most about polymer clay is its versatility.  I love to use it in ways it shouldn't work, so when it does, I get a little happy buzz.  A "yay me, I did it" kind of thing.  

Anyway, I have heard that Pardo, a modeling compound out of Germany marketed by Viva Decor and sold online in jars by polyplayclay.com, offers a more translucent clay than the other manufacturers.  Pardo is made from pure beeswax and other natural ingredients and does not contain any phthalates.

It proved a bit of a challenge for me.  Nothing like being in a slump AND being challenged, right?   So, I donned my mad scientist goggles and put old Frankenstein in the corner for the day and got down to it.  The first thing I had to do was stop trying to make it act like regular polymer clay.  It looks different, it feels different, it even smells different.  The packaging says it has no smell, but I easily detected the pleasant scent of beeswax.  I also liked the the feel of it, too, just slightly waxy, but not sticky like polymer.  There was no icky residue on my hands. 

I tried Pardo in two formats, the small balls packed in a plastic jar which I purchased six of online from polyclayplay.com; and the brick slab form I bought from my local Hobby Lobby.  Hobby Lobby sells online now, and the bricks and balls are also both offered in their virtual store, and cheaper than I could find anywhere else. 

I do think I got an old batch of balls.  They were very hard to condition.  I tried flattening them with my roller, and they crumbled and would not go back together.  The packaging does not contain any instructions on how to bring them back to life, and it would have compromised my scientific findings, doncha know, to add liquid Kato, so I threw away the entire jar (more on that stupid jar later.)  The next jar I opened was marginally better, although I had to slice the balls and run them through the pasta machine a BUNCH of times to get them pliable.   I finally pieced together enough of them to equal about 2 ounces, although the jar says there is 2.7 oz. in each.  I'm wondering if they didn't take the weight of the jar into consideration when calculating that.  I got a scooch under 2 1/2 ounces, but there were some crumbles that got left in bottom of the pasta machine, so that's probably why.

Then, just for the heck of it, I sliced and conditioned one of the 2.1 ounce bricks to see if the clay in the jar equalled the amount of clay in slab form.  I could tell there was less clay in the brick, but not much.  The brick was a whole lot easier to condition, just a few quick turns of the pasta machine and it was good to go.  

The jar was extremely annoying.  It is supposed to be more convenient, with its own screw on top for storing, but all I could think of was that I was paying for air and the weight of the dang jar.  The price for one jar was $4.95.  The price for a 2.1 ounce brick was $2.97, on sale from $3.49.  If the purpose was to make small pieces in a manageable size, I think square pieces or rectangles packaged in a square or rectangle package would have been better, something along the lines of the old, scored Studio bricks would be perfect.   But maybe I'm being too picky?

On to the next step, the real purpose for my Pardo experiment, to see how it takes alcohol inks.  You know I can't live without alcohol inks.  I tried it first with my faux "burma green" jade color recipe from my faux jade tutorial.  To the 2.5-ish ounces of the clay from the jar, I added 12 drops of Ranger Adirondack Willow Green, 4 drops of Lemonade, 2 drops each of Mushroom and Bottle Green, and a scant 1/8 teaspon of Ranger Distressed Walnut Stain embossing powder.   I also added the same amount of ink to roughly two ounces of Premo Translucent and to Fimo #00. 

I baked them at 266 degrees for 30 minutes.  I normally bake my Premo at 275 degrees, and since I only bought the Fimo for this experiment, I forgot to pay attention to how long it should bake (bad sicentist, bad scientist!)  That's probably why it placqued so badly.

I baked another batch at 275 degrees, but it didn't change the color of the Pardo from the batch baked at 266 degrees.  I also baked some Pardo by itself in a very hot, 300 degree oven for 30 minutes, and got a beautiful button that I did not even have to sand or buff.  It came out perfectly beeswaxy shiny!  It was a little "oily" to the touch, but after I wiped it off, it is actually my favorite piece.  I wouldn't recommend baking it at 300 degrees, though.  I'm sure the Pardo people would have a fit, so if you try it at 300 degrees, I did not tell you to do so.  LOL .

In this photo, the top row are the unbaked pieces, the bottom row is the baked, unsanded pieces.  As you can see, there is a significant difference in the colors.  These teardrop shapes were rolled the the pasta machine on the 3rd thickest setting and are about the thickness of a U.S. dime.  Most of my pendants are 1/8" to 1/4" thick.

L-R:  Premo, Fimo, Pardo

One thing I really, really like about the Pardo is that it did not plaque, not once.  I held these pieces up to a bare lightbulb to take these photos, but as you can see, the Fimo plaqued something terrible.  The Premo did to a lesser extent, which I don't mind at all when I use it for faux jade pieces.   The Pardo was also the most translucent of the three.  (A note here:  I probably should have included Kato translucent in my experiment, but the only Kato clay I use is the liquid Polyclay.  The smell puts me off for some reason, so I never got in the habit of using it.  Plus, I am not a cane-maker, and it is best used for canes.  I leave all the lovely Kato for the rest of the world.) 

L-R:  Premo, Fimo, Pardo

The next photo shows the pieces after sanding through 8 grits of wet-dry sandpaper and buffing with a Dremel hand tool.  As I constantly preach, sanding brings out the clarity, buffing adds beautiful depth. 

Here is the faux jade button I baked at 300 degrees, but don't tell anyone, okay?   I don't want the Pardo Police after me.  This piece was not sanded or buffed at all. 

The next step was to add different colors of alcohol inks to see how they would react, with interesting results.  Colors other than green and red/pink stayed pretty true, although they were darker.  I was especially surprised at the baked color of the Pinata Sapphire Blue and the Ranger Sail Boat Blue.  I have a hard time getting a good red from Premo and alcohol ink, and pink shades, which really isn't my color anyway; and I wasn't surprised to find even with Pardo, they still baked a different color than they were supposed to bake.

This photo shows the unbaked Pardo in the top row and the baked color in the bottom row.  Again, I baked at 266 degrees for 30 minutes.   The colors of ink I used are shown, too, except for the second set, which is the faux jade recipe I included above for you.

L-R;  My own Burma Green Faux Jade Color Recipe, Ranger Willow, Ranger Sail Boat Blue, Pinata Sapphire Blue, Ranger Raspberry, Watermelon, Terra Cotta and Sunshine Yellow

The next step was to see how the Pardo mixed with other brands.  I wanted to dull down these bright colors a little, but still have some depth and the appearance of texture, so I added 1 part Premo Gray Granite to 4 parts Pardo.  That is when I started doing the happy dance.  The blend baked beautifully, the translucency was still there, the colors held, and still no plaquing!  

Cynthia will be happy to know I played all weekend with this technique and the Pardo.  I will stick to Premo for my faux jade pieces, I think the color results are more reliable with it than with Pardo (why do I want to type Prada every time instead of Pardo?), but I will be reaching for the Pardo again, just not those annoying little balls.  It's bricks for me!

Here are some of the results of my playtime.  Now these were all sanded through 9 grits of wet-dry sandpaper and Dremel-buffed.  I started with 400 and worked my way up to 3500.  You can see more photos of them in my flickr photostream. 

Thanks for putting up with my experiment.  I apologize for the length of this post, but this was fun and I hope it encourages you to do your own experimenting.  I would love to hear about how you played with clay today.  Send me your photos and I'll post them here for everyone to share. 

Hmmm, I might just have to have a weekly play date with my polymer friends.  What do you say?   Meet me back here Saturday and we'll do this again? 

Back in the Studio... Yay! First Up, February's Art Bead Scene Challenge Entry

Hallelujah!  I actually ventured into my studio and didn't get the heebie jeebies.  I stayed and worked out some of the kinks from a 3 month long slump.  Yes, the lights are beginning to come on again.  More about that and my first experiments with Pardo and alcohol inks later but first, here is my entry in Art Bead Scene's February challenge, the theme of which is based on "The Conference of the Birds by Habiballah," (page from a manuscript of the The Language of the Birds of Farid al-Din `Attar ca. 1600.)

I chose to focus on the beautiful blue green and gold peacock in the center of the illustration, and created these earrings and the peacock focal components,  I used a peacock stamp from cooltools, vintaj Etruscan bead caps, other brass findings, fire polished AB finished Czech glass beads in a beautiful majolica blue; Prussian blue acrylic paint and my own blend of antique gold metallic polymer clay.  I distressed them a bit to add some age, too.  So what do you think?  Do these look like Ancient Persia to you?  

More Scottish and Irish Tartan Jewelry - Sweet Little Brooches



I ran across (no pun intended) these "run rabbit run" vintage pins on Etsy last week, and had to have them.  I am ordering as many as I can find.  I would love to have them in the antique silver finish, too  If anyone knows where they are hiding, please let me know.

I hate to waste anything, and I am  determined to use as much of the pattern as I can.  These images are just big enough to get a 1" circle cut out of and have a little strip left that is wide enough for the opening of these frames.  The finished pieces can be used as brooches or pendants.

I love, love, love them, and so does everyone who has seen them.  Yay!  Several are promised for Valentine's Day, but I can make these in any Scottish or Irish tartan pattern.  More rabbit pins are on the way. 

I have read and studied these tartans so much that I can accurately guess the surname now when I see a pattern.  Unfortunately, Irish tartans are limited to county/districts in Ireland, and there are only 3 that I can find for specific surnames. 

I'm off to hunt wabbits...





Buchanan




Wallace

 

MacLeod of Raasay



Royal Stewart















A Few Valentine's Pieces

I am having a major polymer slump, folks.  I am at the point that I can't even bring myself to go into my studio.  It's a bummer which is reaching epic proportion.  I have read books and magazines and cruised lots of websites for inspiration, but nothing. 

My friend Lupe Meter sent me some photos of a few faux bone and ivory creations she made using my tutorial, and I was so excited about them, that I thought I felt the creative juices start to flow again... but nothing.   Almost everything I have tried has gone straight to the trash pile. 

I think writing the faux bone tutorial just took all the oomph out of me.  It took so long to finish, almost three times as long as my mammoth faux jade tutorial!  I made so many revisions trying to get it just right for all my wonderful customers who were waiting so patiently for it, that I have lost my way with polymer. 

I did manage to create a couple of polymer pieces in the Ancient Romance series, and I did a few Valentine's day transfer pieces, but most of my free time in the past two months has been spent creating non-polymer jewelry.  I am having a lot of fun with the Scottish Tartans.  It's become an obsession, researching and learning the different patterns and the significance of the colors.  I was especially pleased to learn that tartans have been created over the years to commemorate and honor several of the U.S. states and some lineage societies and other public companies and societies.   

My mother, bless her heart, put in a custom order for a necklace in her Forrester tartan.  It's not a recognized tartan because "we" don't have a clan chieftan.  I keep telling my Forrester Uncle he needs to step up, but I don't think he wants to move to Scotland.  Hee Hee.   I haven't come across a Scottish Forrester castle, so it might be for the best.  Imagine what the taxes on a castle? 

My mother wanted to incorporate her birthstone, the Opal, into the design, so I added a sand opal Swarovski flatback rhinestone in the bail.  Not my first choice, but you know the old saying, "If Momma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy."  Yes, Momma, whatever you want, Momma, even if it doesn't match, Momma.  She'll wear it to a Red Hat to-do next week and show it off. 

I was particularly pleased to find the New York Firemen's Emerald Society Pipes and Drums Tartan pattern featured in this necklace. 2012 marks the 50th anniversary of the charter for the FDNY's Emerald Society, and the tartan was created for them in the 1960s, too.  

So if you are interested in a Scottish Tartan necklace, let me know.  I have virtually every Scottish surname tartan, several Irish district tartans, and a few company and commemorative tartans created for U.S. states, companies, societies and commemorative events.  I have sold several of these since I started making them, and they make wonderfully unique gifts, no matter the occasion.   The tartans look best with the antique silver components, but I can frame them in antique brass, too.     



 



Art Bead Scene Designer of the Week!

I love a nice surprise, and it sure was a great one to find out that Melanie Brooks of Earthenwood Studio chose me as the Designer of the Week at Art Bead Scene today!  Yay, yay, yay!  I am doing the happy dance today, and what a nice little bit of added inspiration to get back to the polymer!  Thank you so much for the honor, Melanie! 



  

Hangin' Out On A Branch With BeeTreeByMe

My friend Mary Ellen, a/k/a BeeTreeByMe, blogged about my Rock Goddess Earrings today on her blog.  Her post encouragses us to branch out in 2012 and try something new in our creative endeavors.   

I have been feeling guilty about not using polymer in my latest designs, and M.E. gave me a boost with her post.  I still love polymer, and will never abandon it, but I think it's time to knock down the sides of that box and see what else I can do.  I was worried that I'd lose sight of style I've become known for, that elegant, heirloom look that I love; and that no one would recognize my new work as mine.  M.E. pretty much squashed that notion for me by saying that she liked that I could step outside my comfort zone and still maintain my personal style.  She felt the earrings were a good example of that, and we've come up with a new name for the style "Edgy Heirloom."  So, a great big hug and a THANK YOU, M.E.  I'll go out on a limb with you anytime, my friend!  

Speaking of non-polymer, here are a few of the newest necklaces I've been working on this weekend.   If you would like to see more, and more detail on these, please visit my flickr photostream. 

 

 

   

Tonight, it's back to the studio to start on some polymer pieces inspired by St. Valentine's Day, and some Celtic knot jewelry inspired by my Irish roots and St. Patrick's Day.