Hi there.
Sandy here.
Welcome to another polymer clay video at KeepsakeCrafts.net.
Today is part two in my two part series on making this necklace based on flowers from
the garden.
I hope you'll enjoy.
So here I have one of the flowers I showed you how to make in the last video and these
are the flowers that I used as inspiration.
They're comfrey flowers and as you can see, they resemble them although it's not exactly
the same and I thought these were just a little bit plain and so I decided to add some paint
details.
Again inspired by these, but not necessarily copying them exactly.
The first detail that I really like about these is on some of the darker ones is these
purple stripes that almost look like brush strokes.
So what I have here is just a piece of card and I found some paint.
This is Ceramcoat in eggplant.
You don't need much at all.
Just the cap will do.
A liner brush is nice and then you just dip the end of the liner brush into the paint
and then you're just going to brush it off on the card a few times till you start to
get these kind of dry edges.
And then I'm just going to make a strip under each of my peaks.
Now don't worry if it comes out a little too heavy.
We can fix that once it's dry.
You can see I'm not being, trying to be super precise here.
I'm really just adding some color and interest and detail to the flower.
The next detail that I really liked about these flowers was this white edge just around
the lip.
I thought that was really pretty and so I have some white paint and again, you don't
need anything more than the cap and this time I just have a very small brush and I'm going
to dip it in the paint.
Now this part can be a little tricky.
What you want to do is not so much paint this white on the edges as rub it along the edge
so that you're just getting it on the very edge of your flower.
Now as you're twirling it in your fingers, it's going to become awkward, so what I did
was I stuck the handle of my brush in to hold it and then reposition and then just come
back with the paint.
Just adding that nice white right along the very edge.
Now the cool thing about polymer clay is that if you get acrylic paint on it in places you
don't want, once it's dry, you can use really any kind of blade you want, like a craft blade
to scrape the paint off the areas that you don't want it.
So it's a nice way to go and refine.
And then the final detail that I liked on these was some of them have these dots, just
these little white dots that I thought were cute and so while I have my tiny brush and
the white paint, I'm just going to add some little tiny dots.
Now many of these came out way too big, but again once the paint is dry, I'll go back
in with my craft blade and scrape off the ones that are too big and make them smaller.
And now by this point, this purple paint should be dry enough to scrape.
Take your blade and barely put any pressure at all.
Just the lightest amount of pressure and you can see you can kind of make those edges less
regular.
I'm just going to kind of refine that.
However you want.
So here is is after I've just gone back in with the blade and kind of refined it and
now it's time to make it into a dangle.
Now some of these I poked holes before baking and some I didn't for some reason.
This is the drill bit I often use.
It's a 1/16" drill bit.
It's about the smallest one you can find at your local hardware store, but this is a little
big for this flower.
So what I'm using is this little 1mm drill bit that I got at a hobby store for doing
models and such.
And with this flower I have much less chance of blowing out my hole with this smaller drill
bit.
So you just go in one way and then in the other.
And now to finish your flower, you'll need a head pin.
I have a little gold ball head pin, some filler beads and I've told you often when you buy
strands of beads you'll find these filling in the strands and it's a good idea to save
them, just for something like this.
And here I have a little 4mm Swarovski crystal in fuchsia.
And so my crystal goes on my head pin and then as many of these beads as you need toi
fill out the length of the tube of your flower.
So depending on how thick this bottom part is will depend on how many of these beads
you'll need.
That's just about right.
Make adjustments if you need to.
Now the head pins I'm using today are 22 gauge, so they're a little fine for making just a
simple loop, but they're a little too short for me to make a wrapped loop.
So what I'm going to do is something I showed you in a Friday Findings video, which is a
split ring loop, which basically means I'm just going to twirl this around and get about
two wraps.
And so now this is more secure than just a simple loop, but it uses less wire and is
also quite a bit quicker than doing a wrapped loop.
Now the next thing that you'll need to deal with once they're baked are your leaves and
again, I'm just going to drill a hole in those using the smaller diameter drill bit.
And then to add a little color and interest, I'm going to add some Gilders Paste.
This is the color African Bronze.
It's kind of a green-y gold as you can see and it's a wax based product.
And my favorite way of applying it is to put it on my finger and then rub it lightly over
my pieces.
And that just leaves the clay color in the recesses and highlights that detail that's
on the surface.
And now it's time to assemble your necklace.
I've already gone ahead and started here and what I did was I cut a 30" piece of chain
and I used jump rings and I just started adding leaves and blossoms at intervals up the chain.
It will depend on the type of chain you use, how many links apart you put all your pieces
and so I'll just go ahead and add these last two.
Of course you want to make sure that your jump rings are closed securely.
And these are 5mm jump rings I used.
Now to finish it all up, you'll need one more jump ring.
And here's where you get to make fun decisions.
If you want, let's see, I've got four flowers on this end.
I could put this right here where there's four flowers on this end and have a very symmetrical
'y' shaped necklace, but I can put it down here and have almost just a ring, a straight
ring around or you could put it up here and have it asymmetrical, which is what I think
I'm going to do.
So that's a design decision you make.
You just connect the end of the chain here to the chain over here and your necklace is
done.
If you're not happy with the length, you can cut the chain at some point in the back and
then add a clasp and a jump ring.
So if you're interested in the supplies I used in this project, there's a link in the
upper right as well as in the description box to go to the accompanying blog post.
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Here's another look at the project we made.
If you like it give it a thumbs up and share.
Happy creating.
Bye bye.