Amazing Polymer Clay

With the holidays upon us I am seeing lots of cute ornament ideas on Pinterest. So today I thought I would share one of my favorite ornament making mediums- polymer clay. In case you have never heard of it, it is a "clay" that stays malleable until baked in the oven. Once baked its becomes a semi-flexible, but sturdy plastic. Here are a few ornaments I have made using it.

There are several different brand brands and lots of colors to choose from. I usually use Sculpey or Fimo, because they are readily available at my local craft stores.

The colored blocks are small, 2oz, but one block can go a long way.  If you are making a large project or want to paint it yourself, Sculpey sells a large 1lb package of white.  The Sculpey website,  is a great resource for tips and project ideas.

As you can see, I've been playing with this big block! I love these big white blocks for kids hand print ornaments.  I have aggravated my nephew on a couple occasions trying to get him do multiple hand prints for Santa ornaments! In the end, he was really excited to give them to his grandparents and tell them how he made them. Once baked the clay can be painted and since it turns into a firm plastic they last really well even if dropped! Here are his Santa ornaments we made. Little hands are so cute!

Even the more intricate ones are pretty durable and if a piece does break off its easily fixed with super glue (ask me how I know lol).  Another good thing about polymer clay is that it doesn't take much to get started you can probably find most sculpting tools around the house. Just be sure to have clay dedicated tools, meaning don't use your good pan to bake the clay in then plan on using that same pan  to bake cookies. That's a big no-no! When I started doing more clay work I even invested in a toaster oven just for baking clay so I wasn't scrubbing down my oven after every clay baking session. I may seem overly cautious but I didn't like the thought of any plastic residue being in there and it never hurts to have a clean oven! I also like to keep some baby wipes handy to clean my hands between color changes. I will leave you with one final picture of a polymer clay item I made and was super proud of.
I made this for Andy Runton the creator of Owly; an adorable comic about a little owl and his friend wormy. Here is a link to his site because I know you will want to see more of this adorable little owl! http://www.andyrunton.com/ This was a piece of fan art I made and gave to him at a comic book convention over 10 years ago! So proof that it holds up well, but more importantly you can even make new friends with polymer clay! Thanks again Andy for the picture!