New Silver/Brass Bracelet

Bracelets are always popular, especially as summer rolls around and arms are bare once again. so I was especially pleased to find some new silver and brass bracelets that are adjustable. Making bracelets fit is always a challenge. These have silver wire sides, so they can be bent to fit. The decoration behind the flower is silver bonded to brass. I have been experimenting with ways to attach polymer flowers to them, and have just taken my first piece from the oven. That's it in the photo at the left. i really like the way it turned out. it will be interesting to see "public" reaction. I'll be sure to post photos of a couple more when I get them done.

Polymer Pictures

A short while ago, I gave an onlline tutorial class to my polymer "group". It's a small group of women who have been with me for a long time. Originally, we met when they attended beadweaving workshops I was offering at a place called Nature's Art Village. After several years, my classes moved to a small beading shop. At that time, I also began to offer classes in polymer. That shop closed, and we moved to a church rental location. Then came Covid. We couldn't meet in person, so we migrated to Zoom. We're still meeting periodically on Zoom which allows everyone to "be there", even through illness, surgery and all the various events that occur in life. As I write this, I realize that I have been with some of these women for close to 30 years. They are special people, and I'm happy we've continued to stay connected. Our most recent "class" was on making polymer pictures to fit in small frames. The image shown here is in a 3" x 4" frame. The frame is purchased, and the backing and glass are removed. The glass serves as the "pattern" for cutting out a flat polymer background. In this case, I made a Skinner blend for the background, and added a slight texture. The flowers were cut outs, and the stems and leaves I formed by hand. It only required simple assembly on the unbaked clay background - and, of course, the addition of a butterfly from a cane I had made previously. Cured in the oven, inserted into the frame with the backing, and it's set to go. The picture can be anything from something like flowers to a wild abstract! Simple and fun! Give it a try!

Polymer Pens

You probably noticed the pen covered in polymer in the last post. I discovered that the Bic Click pens work perfectly for this purpose. The ends and the ink portion all remove easily from the white core. Polymer can then wbe wrapped around the core and baked. After baking, I sanded so everything was smooth, polished it on my buffer, and re-assembled everything. I like this particular pen because the core is round rather than multi-sided, so it's easier to smooth the clay. Also, the mechanism is retractable, so the pen won't tend to leak or dry out. Here is photo of some more pens I made. I have some more curing. Guess you could say I'm on a roll!