Spring Bird's Nest

Spring is on its way!! We hear the birds chirping their morning greetings. This month Chloe and I decided to make our own bird's nest.

We used Creative Paperclay®, a clay extruder (my favorite clay toy tool), and a canape cutter.

Chloe rolled a piece of clay into a log and put it in the extruder; I did the plunging. We coiled the extruded strands into a nest shape.

Next, we rolled out a piece of clay to about 1/8" thickness, and cut a circle for the back of the nest. We used a thin layer of slip between the nest and the circle to be sure the two pieces fused. This circle serves two purposes—it closes the bottom of the nest and provides a flat surface to attach a pin back or necklace bail.

Three small pinches of clay were formed into egg shapes to fill our nest. 

After the nest and eggs were complete dry, we began the painting process. Before applying paint I always seal pieces with PPA. A short wait for the PPA to dry, then painting. We used raw umber acrylic paint for the nest and turquoise, golden yellow, and maroon for the eggs. (Game of Thrones fans do you see a connection here???) When those were dry, we dry brushed both the nest and eggs with a gold metallic acrylic to add highlights. 

Our nest and eggs are tiny!!

Here's our finished bird's nest—the perfect decoration for spring. And don't forget that you could add a pin back or jewelry bail to have a wearable piece of art.

Carole	Chloe
Table Cell	Table Cell