Holiday Spinners

The year has gone by so quickly!  I am getting ready to celebrate the holidays and so happy to be back in Arizona where I belong.  Don't have my tree up yet but decided to try making some ornaments to hang in the windows or wherever they seem to fit.

If you'd like to try creating some of your own, you will need -
Delight™ air dry modeling compound
pattern
scrap piece of board or cardboard, about 4" x 8"
acrylic paints
a fishing swivel
plain paper
white glue
rolling pin
plastic wrap
masking tape
pliers
monofilament or thread
round toothpick
craft knife
decorative bead or beads, as desired

Here is the pattern I designed for this project:
if you click on the image it should take you to a page where you can print it.

Print the pattern, but out the semicircular shape with the tabs.  Use the guide at the edge to mark 2 pairs of parallel lines onto cardboard, then mark line perpendicular to those at approximately 2" intervals, as shown.

Roll clay out to 1/16" thickness.  place circular pattern cutout lightly on clay and trace around it with a craft knife.  Gently lift out the cut out piece and place it onto the cardboard, aligning the top tab with the top line as shown.  Press the tab portion onto the cardboard just enough to make it stick, then add a piece of tape to hold it in place.

Now carefully lift up the bottom edge and turn it to the other side, creating a twist in the piece.  Align it with the marks on the cardboard, press and tape into place.

Repeat the process for the next piece -

you will need two for each ornament (or, you can try adding one or more extras onto a single ornament if you like).
Set the clay curves aside to dry.

Remove the clip on the fishing swivel, if there is one, and use pliers to pinch one of the end loops on the swivel to make it smaller than the ball in the center, as shown.

Cut a strip of paper the width of the top tabbed section on the pattern and about 1" to 1 1/2" long.  Roll the strip around a toothpick, then place the swivel inside and tighten or loosen the strip so that it fits snugly onto the swivel.  Glue the paper roll into a tube, but do NOT glue it to the swivel.  Make another paper tube for the bottom tab.

Prepare the string for your ornament by putting a stop bead on the end.
cut a strip of paper the same size or just slightly smaller than the hole in your bead.

Fold the paper in half, tie the end of a length of monofilament around the paper (12" to 14" of monofilament should be more than enough - it's better to have it longer than you need it at this point, so you have room for tying off the ends later).  Fold the paper in half again, keeping the monofilament in the fold.  Pull both ends of the monofilament up through the bead, put glue on both sides of the paper and pull it up into the bead to hold the monofilament snugly.  (clip off the ends of the paper if it is sticking out below the bottom of the bead.  Trim the extra "tail" off the monofilament so you have a single strand coming from the top of the bead.

When the clay pieces are dry, trim the tabs off in line with the marks on the cardboard.  Glue a paper tube to each end of the curved clay as shown, making sure that the tubes are in line with each other.

When the glue is dry, attach another clay twist to the other side.

It should appear to be a figure eight when looking through the lined-up tubes from the top or bottom of the ornament.

Allow the glue to dry, then paint as desired.

To string the ornament, put the monofilament with the bead on the end that you prepared earlier up through the bottom tube.  If desired, add a center bead in the center of the ornament by either knotting the monofilament where you want the bead to sit and gluing the bead in place, or by wrapping a piece of tape around the line and securing the bead to it with glue.

Thread the monofilament through the top tube of the ornament, through the bottom (squished) end of the swivel, then back through the top tube of the ornament.  Pull the swivel snugly into the tube, then make a knot in the monofilament to hold it in place.

Hang it up and blow on it gently to watch it spin, or place in a breezy doorway or window.

I hope each of you have Marvelously Happy Holidays, whichever ones you celebrate!

Thanks for joining me here again!  As always, play, experiment, and have fun!

Tori

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Lyneen's Last Quick Tip

This is my last post as a member of the Creative Paperclay® Design Team. I have had a great time sharing my ideas with you this past year. 

For my final not so quick tip I thought I would share some of the projects I have done over this last year.  When viewing them I noticed they all had one thing in common, all of them are finished with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer, most have Terry Sproul Mixers. 

What I have found is Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer is a one step finish on Creative Paperclay®.  When I used the lacquer mixed with the mixers I only had to paint my projects one time and had a sealed coating on the Creative Paperclay®. 

This mask was for my Creative Paperclay® Design Team application in April of 2012, it was never posted on the Creative Paperclay® blog. Made by molding Creative Paperclay over an inexpensive mask. The flower is a paper napkin adhered with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer. The rest of the mask is painted with Sakura Crystal Lacquer and Terri Sproul Mixers: Red Garnet and Citrine mixed (making a beautiful tangerine color.)  See more about the Mask HERE on my blog!

For this altered tin I molded a Frozen Charlotte with Creative Paperclay® from an Articus mold. She was painted with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer and Terri Sproul Mixers - Citrine. Original post is HERE!

My Creative Paperclay® wall pocket was inspired by vintage Victorian wall pockets. The pocket was painted with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer and Terri Sproul Mixers - Bronze. It has a very vintage look, see the original post HERE.

The Creative Paperclay® Fascinator is one of the only projects  that I painted with craft paint (black) and came back and sealed it with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer. Original post HERE!

The Creative Paperclay® crown fit for a princess was painted with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer and Terri Sproul Mixers - Gold. One of the only projects I gave a second coat of the Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer/Mixers.  I was after a "rich golden color." Original post HERE!

This inexpensive bird house was altered with Creative Paperclay® peices. The Creative Paperclay® pieces were painted with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer and Terri Sproul Mixers:large leaves -  Pearl Green, tiny flowers - Citrine Pearl, large flowers - Rose Pearl, small leaves - Tanzanite Pearl mixed with Shimmer Citrine and birds Aquamarine Pearl. Original post HERE!

 

 

The Fall Tree was created for the Creative Paperclay® and Amazing Mold Putty Blog Hop, which was never posted on the Creative Paperclay® blog. The leaves are molded out of Creative Paperclay® and painted with Sakura 3D Crystal Lacquer and Terry Sproul Mixers - Citrine Pearl, Rose Pearl and Shimmer Garnet. I love how the colors mixed when I painted the leaves. Original post HERE!

You can bet I will be using Creative Paperclay® in many of my future projects and will be sharing them on my blog, Dreaming of Castles.