Oh - what is it? Polymer clay! Holy cow, where have they been hiding this stuff? It's like the perfect art medium. You can do just about anything with it. You can make beads (of an incredible variety), or sculptures which could become anything (jewelry parts, pins, Christmas ornaments, etc.), you can make boxes and vases, cabinet door knobs - pretty much anything decorative that exists, you can create (or re-create) out of polymer clay. You can put things in it (gems, stones, wire, metal), you can paint it or treat it with metallic or decorative powders ...
... I know, I'm gushing. I'm pretty enthralled.
I tried polymer clay many years ago, when all there was, was Fimo. It was hard and crumbly and I couldn't accomplish anything with it. I only bought one or two packages, messed with it once, and I think threw it out.
I had one other foray into clay, a few years ago at an event there was a 'dress up your stuffed animal' contest. I had a stuffed bear I decided to dress as Robin Hood, so I made him a quiver and bow out of clay. Problem was, I didn't know you had to bake it. (duh) So I got the bow made okay, and it looked alright, but when I tried to attach a taut string to it, it just began to bend.
This time I did a little reading up before trying anything. (and they have better quality stuff now - the clay I bought, Sculpey and Premo, is FAR easier to work with than that beta version of Fimo) So my first project was totally successful! It was a necklace - I made some of the beads out of clay, then after that was done, added another clay embellishment to one of the plain beads, and re-baked it. (Yep, you can even do that! and I didn't even have to take the necklace apart to re-bake it, because the low temperatures used for clay - about 260 degrees - wouldn't harm the other metal findings or the leather cord it's strung on). It turned out pretty nice (I forgot to take a picture of it today though).
What really got me fired up (no pun intended) about polymer clay, though was a book I ran onto by accident called "Steampunkery" - steampunk polymer clay sculpture. Totally, completely awesome. (that's what all the detritus in the lower half of the picture up there is - watch parts for steampunk sculpture!)
So some of my first projects are going to be steampunk Christmas ornaments. :o) I mentioned this to my friend Wren, and she wants one, so today's marathon session was creating a steampunk bird ornament for her. It's going really well, but it's not done yet, so no good pictures. I have lots of other steampunk Christmas ornament ideas ... steampunk Santa, and/or steampunk sleigh pulled by a mechanical reindeer ... an airship (of course!) ... wreaths, snowflakes, 'regular' ornaments with various interesting embellishments ... steampunk angels? The imagination staggers.
I'm also working on a second necklace (made the beads for it today, just haven't put it all together yet), and then another necklace - I'm designing these around my wardrobe. (I'm turning into such a girl). I recently bought a turquoise sweater, since most of my wardrobe of late has been various shades of brown, and I thought I needed something colorful. It's a v-neck sweater, so I thought a nice piece of jewelry to wear with it wouldn't go amiss. While brainstorming what would go with turquoise, I decided on a snowy-looking, turquoise-and-white winter theme. There are going to be turquoise and crystal beads, with probably some snowflakes, and a clay snowman motif going on somewhere.
Well, I'll stop now. But I'm thinking some of the other hobbies are going to be hitting the highway, because I'm pretty well seriously addicted to this clay stuff.
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