Playing with clay

Don't laugh!!!  I'm a beginner!  I've got so much to learn, and this is going to be a real process.  I have been searching as much as I can on the internet on making polymer clay beads as well as checked out a couple books from the local library.  I've been working on some very basic things, and the ONLY reason I'm showing you these things...not because I'm so proud of them...but because I'm hoping for some guidance (maybe Marie? :)

The first thing I did was a simple jellyroll.  Matthew helped me late one night over the weekend.  We had fun together!  We picked red and yellow...good high contrasting colors.  My first lesson was all about translucents.  lol.  The yellow didn't look so yellow after being baked.  Ok, so I think we did all right on the jellyroll...except that I can't cut them right.  I watched videos and read and watched more videos and read some more.  I learned that the clay has to rest in between steps or it will become distorted.  Check.  I'm not usually a patient person, so this will be a real test for me, but I did let the clay rest, and even refrigerated, between steps.  But the clay just seemed to get so warm and soft so fast.  When I would go to cut the slices they wouldn't stay round.  I even rolled the cane a little as I sliced downward like I'd seen the pros do.  But mine still came out all wonky. 

Next I decided to try a simple flower looking cane.  I chose a gold, bright blue, black and a hint of white (which was such a "hint" that it altogether disappeared later in the process).  I got the cane all cut, let it chill, stretched it out, let it chill, and then went to cut it.  Same problem...lopsided slices.  grrrr.  AND by looking at the petals I realized I was twisting as I was stretching because the circles became distorted.  Even so, I was ok with my first attempt at a flower cane.

Decided to go a step further and make that cane into another cane.  cut the pieces, stacked them, wrapped, let it chill in the fridge overnight.  The next day I stretched and pulled.  I did a much better job of keeping the cane straighter as I stretched this time.  BUT I still can't cut a slice to save my life. When I did the slices some were thicker than others.  On the really bad ones I was going to put the clay in the "mud" bag, but decided to see what it would look like if I made the garbage into beads.  Kind of a nice affect.  Lesson learned...nothing is garbage.  Try different things and you just might get something interesting. 

This is the "mud swirl" made from garbage

This is a side-by-side progression of my canes

After I let the slices and beads chill again, I tried making the bead holes through them.  They became even more distorted.  *whimper, sniffle*  Still I carried on.  Next was sanding.  That didn't last long.  How in the world do you sand something so small???  I couldn't even hold onto them, let alone sand them.  I ended up putting the sandpaper on the table and holding it with one hand while rubbing the tops and bottoms with the other hand.  I wonder how long one has to sand in order to get that glassy finish I've seen the pros do?

Oh...I forgot.  I also did some wrapped beads by layering four colors of circles into the extruder, pushing out long snakes, wrapping a core bead made from mud (again, using the garbage), baked them and then started sanding down through the layers of colors.  Looked really cool on the video, but it seems the only color I could get to show through was the orange.  There was also yellow and green in there.  Still a fun bead to make, and I'll probably play with this one a little more in the future.

So that was my adventure in an intro to polymer clay over the weekend.  No masterpieces yet. lol.  No...that will take quite some time, I'm sure.  But I'll keep you posted on my progress.  And anyone who wants to chime in with any tips, I'm ready for it!!!  Oh!  I've got some molds on order that I'm hoping come any day now in the mail.  Got about 5 different cab molds.  It will be fun to swirl colors and powders and glitter together to see what happens!  Will post more on that later.

Bead happy.