Today's Projects and Adventures

As most of you know, my favorite sculpting medium is polymer clay. (Someday that will change when I get a kiln and can play with regular clay too!)

I have been concentrating on getting existing pieces sold before making new ones, which is one of my challenges. But I had a custom order to make a goldfish sculpture as a memorial to a friend who recently lost a goldfish. His name was Gabriel and he was a beautiful calico fantail. This is the progression of creating him with polymer clay.

Here's how he started out!




Here he is just before I put him in the oven. The white clay is actually translucent, so it looks much brighter and more opaque before it's cooked.



After being cooked! Unfortunately, in trying to make the fins more thin and delicate, I broke the dorsal fin.






I also made a smaller calico goldfish, too.



So that's been my day. While dinner is cooking, I need to start on my other custom order, a koi watercolor! Signing off for now.

~Jenny

Rainbows and Snails

These are some of my latest tiny polymer clay creations. There is a five-year-old trapped within me who still loves rolling clay into snakes and snails! If I'd had polymer clay when I was a kid... forget about it!

Recently I bought a polymer clay snail from a seven-year-old child on Etsy! His or her mother helped her kids list their items, which I thought was so cool. If I'd had the internet when I was little, I hope I would have been able to do the same thing!

These little guys can be made in just about any color. I think I'm going to make even tinier ones (these are 1") and sell them as scrapbook embellishments. If I ever saw something like them in a scrapbook store, I'd buy them!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=25016121

Snails can be a good thing!

Remember pouring salt on snails as a kid to watch them foam and dissolve? That gives me chills now thinking of it!

Those common garden snails actually go by the scientific name Hedera helix and in very rare cases even show up in sinstral form (where the shell opening is on the left hand side rather than the right!).

Anyway, they're seen as pests by most and I agree, having them mow down a flower bed of colorful verbena is very frustrating. But did you know that snails are actually a sign of a mature, healthy yard? My mom's house was built 16 years ago on a dry river bed, and it's taken about 14-15 years to start getting snails in the yard.

Of course, it's annoying when you walk on the sidewalk at night and find them crunching under your feet. They also have a tendency to fall into the fish pond, only to become a tasty treat for the koi and goldfish!

Here is my homage to the lowly garden snail. This is a one of a kind sculpture I made with polymer clay. I love and respect these little critters!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=19704664