Flickr Favorites

1. String along cup, 2. IMG_8079, 3. Untitled, 4. ceramic bags

This weeks favorites are all about clay/porcelain clay. I love the whiteness of it when it's fired.
I love textures and I love clever ideas. Aren't those ceramic bags cool?
OK, I cheated as I already used the picture from Greenberries once ('untitled') but I just love the repetition of the texture.
The first picture is a reminder to put resistand wax on my supply list! Want to experiment a bit with that in the future. I love the result of the embossed line on those vases.

If you like to play this week, make your mosaic and add a link to your blogpost (NOT your blog please) or Flickr in Mister Linky (click on the button below and fill in your name with the link to your blogpost or Flickr picture).
I'll pop over to have a look at yours. Can't wait to see your creations and find new favorites! :)

Secret Santa is taking orders

Leaves are starting to fall here and there, the days are slowly getting shorter and here we've already been treated with rain and wind.
Fall is in sight & I love it as fall is my very favorite season.
In a distance, I also see Secret Santa is taking orders. Secret Santa is a game played by the European Streetteam on Etsy. The idea behind the Secret Santa is that you make something for a teammember and also receive a gift yourself.
You have to be part of the team to participate though. People can sign up by sending me a conversation on Etsy. In return I sent them back a tiny questionnaire where they have to fill out some basic questions. They sent it back to me & when I have all the questionnaires back, I start matching up people. This is a fun process because I get to read all the answers of the questionnaire but it's also very hard because I really would like everyone to be happy with their secret friend. I will also be blogging about some of the answers of the teammembers - all anonymous of course but it's nice to share & get to know the team better.

Here's a call to everyone who has not seen my numerous messages about the Secret Santa on the team thread, in the Yahoo group or on Twitter: you have to sign up before the 15th of september to participate!

How to use a metal letter stamp set with clay?

In July, I saw the new exchange program on Totally Tutorials. The idea behind it is that suppliers offer supplies in exchange for a tutorial. As you all know, I love making tutorials & I love supplies so I didn't have to think twice. I applied for the nice set of 1.5mm letter/number stamps from Evie's Tool Emporium. They arrived very soon after she decided who was going to get them, but I was so busy preparing for the craft fairs that I didn't have much time to play around with them. Well, time has come to show you what I did with them...
I used polymer clay (Fimo) to create gift tags from them. I decided to try white and black and see what the results were.
Here is what you need:

Metal stamping letters/numbers set, polymer clay, acrylic paint, flat wooden sticks, ceramic tiles or glass, cookie cutters, rolling pin, embossing tool or fat needle, paper plate, paintbrush and a cloth.

Take a piece of polymer clay and soften it while kneading.

Put the flat wooden sticks on the ceramic tile (makes it easier to transfer to the oven) and roll with the rolling pin over the clay so that it's nice, flat and even.When you rolled out a piece, lift it up carefully and
transfer it to another tile so you can roll out more little clay slabs.

Punch with your cookie cutters, figures out of the polymer clay slab.

I made two sets in black and white clay.

Before you stat using your letter stamp set, wipe it off with a soft cloth. The stamps are a bit oily to make sure they don't start to rust.Before you start stamping, try your stamp on a sample of Polymer clay.
This way you know how hard you have to press the stamp to get result and it will also be good to see if you're not holding the stamp upside down.

Hold the metal stamptool as straight as possible and press lightly into the clay.

Here is what I stamped...

If you click on this picture below, you will see better what I stamped on the clay.

Take your embossing tool or needle to punch a hole in the clay.

Carefully take the piece of clay off the ceramic tile and punch with your embossingtool or needle on the backside of the clay so that the hole can be used.

Preheat your oven to 110°C or read the instructions on the packaging of the polymer clay you are using.

Put the ceramic tiles with the clay pieces in the oven for 30 minutes
and let it cool down afterwards. It's ready to use when they feel cold.

Put some acrylic paint on a paper plate and paint the sides and front of the clay.

Let it dry for a while.

When it's dry, rub it with a damp cloth
so that most of the paint will come off again.

The harder you rub, the more paint will come off.

Here is another example with gold acrylic paint. Paint it.

Rub the paint away with a damp cloth.

Ready!

Here are some results on the white and black clay. On the white ones, the paint doesn 't look really good I think but I love the black ones. On the white ones, the paint just looks a bit dirty...
It obviously is best to use this technique with colored polymer and contrasting paint.

I made a little package with very thin metal wire. I twist the wire around a needle to create a tiny spiral.

I used chrochet thread to wrap double around the package.

You can also make it an ornament.

Wrap lots of chrochet thread around the package and add the clay label.

Only wrap thread around one edge and attach the clay gift tag.

In case you have a hard time getting the thin thread
through the little hole, here's a tiny trick that makes it super easy...
Cut a small piece of metal wire.

Fold the metal thread in half and put the thread in between.

Stick the metal thread through the little hole of the clay.

See how easy it is, you don't even need glasses for that! :)

I love the white, untreated gift tags best, they kind of look like porcelain clay...

There are lots of possibilities with this metal letter stamp set and I can't wait to use it for my ceramic work too. If you like to try it for yourself, don't hesitate and order a set of your own at EviesToolEmporium. I garantuee you lots of pleasure with it! :)
Michele from EviesToolEmporium also gave away a metal letterstamp set to a jewelry designer who used it to stamp metal. She made a little video montage and it's awesome, you can find that tutorial here.
If you like to receive all the gifttags that I made for making this tutorial, please leave a comment & you'll automatically enter this give-away. :) There's many more then you see in the pictures!
The winner will be announced next week.
Congrats Evylyn of Sumikoshop! I'll be sending out the gift tags soon! :)

Make sure to check out Totally tutorials on a regular basis for lots of fun DIY projects.

Dream in progress... part 10

After all the encouragement from you all last week, I managed to crochet 12 squares. I already had 1 done so that makes 3 to go! I was on fire the past week!
My Babette blanket is slowly coming to the end stage of crocheting.
Only 7 more 8 round-squares - yay! Then I will need to weave in all threads and start putting it together. I hope that it will be done before it gets cold so I can snuggle underneath it... I'm so looking forward to that part! :)

The secret project

Those who follow me on Twitter or read my newsletter already know I'm working on a secret project. I'm collaborating with an Etsy artist. I'm not saying any more!
The reason why this is secret is because we would like to show you work in progress once in a while. And perhaps after some time, you can guess who this secret person is I'm collaborating with...
So, it's a guessing game and you can only guess once.
The person who is the first to guess who I'm collaborating with will get one -yet undecided- item of the new line we're setting up.
No, you can't ask any questions nor will I respond to guesses in any of the comments.
Actually, we won't announce the winner until we list our first item...
You can send your guess to mitsy@artmind.eu and can not change your guess so think about it carefully...
The picture above is a first look into our work in progress...

My creative space

Today I'm finishing a tutorial about how to use a metal letterstamp set. I'll be making gift tags in polymer clay and show some ideas about wrapping in the tutorial.
The tutorial will be up sometime soon so stay tuned! :)

Want to show your creative space? Hop over to Kootoyoo's to play! It's fun! :)

Plok Plok

About a week ago, we were invited to dinner at one of my friends house. I've know her for about 20 years and it's one of those friends that you feel at ease with even though you haven't seen each other for a long time.
We travelled together through Nepal & Turkey many years ago and I must say that these were my best travels ever. It still makes me laugh out loud when we talk about it.
Years passed were we only called each other once or twice but that didn't really matter. At the end of last year, she called me and told me she was going to move to the neighborhood we live in, actually around the corner! :) She lives there with her husband Halil and daughter Boussé. While we were having dinner, they were telling us that they were going to buy two chickens.
Erwin and I looked at each other and I actually squeeled a bit and Lieve knew right away what this was about... We have always wanted to have a chicken but our garden is too small to have them there. Initially we did plan to sacrifice our garden set for a chicken hotel. It never happened though. But Lieve said she wouldn't mind to buy 3 chickens and we could 'rent' a room in the chicken apartment. YAY! :)
I asked her to get a 'real' chicken which for me is light brown. She and Boussé had a hard time choosing the chickens at the market much to dismay of the seller who said 'a chicken is a chicken'. Sjeez, he didn't seem to understand that choosing a chicken is part of the fun.
Anyway, here is the new extension to our family...

Her name is 'PlokPlok'

Her she is with her sisters.

This is the chicken hotel.

Hopefully they will treat us with lots of eggs..

Here is where they sleep.

She feels already very much at home here!

We are so happy to have a chicken and the best thing is that PlokPlok will make sure that Lieve and I get to see each other more frequently now! :)