I started making these brooches back in July 2009 but they have been sat waiting to be finished since then.They are made from shrink plastic and then painted with acrylic paint. They are about 6cm in diameter.Finally they are finished!Shrink plastic and acrylic paint brooches

A while ago I saw instructions to make a  necklace in a jewellery magazine that I loved. I thought wow I am going to make one of those. I set of to the computer to buy the beads listed and realised that the price of the components was over £60! Now I have never spent that much on a piece of jewellery before and didn’t intend to start spending that now either. I realised that the most expensive part was the silver flower focal bead because...

copperpinkswirl3Originally uploaded by purplecactusstudiosI have made several lentil beads in the past but they all sit in my big box of polymer clay things yet to be given a lease of life. The new improved me who actually makes things needs to get using them so what shall I do with them?I found loads of lentil bead jewellery on flickr (that link will take you to my lentil bead gallery, wish you could have more than 18 images in a gallery I...

Perles givrées – Frosted beadsOriginally uploaded by gRiS bLEuI have to say I  often see polymer clay things that are breathtakingly beautiful. There are so many talented people out there! I have an ever growing collection of favourites on flickr.I came across this from Gris Bleu today and I just had to share it.

It’s the weekend and the kids are around so it is time for family but my kind husband took the kids down to the gym this morning which meant I had just over an hour of clay time alone. I spent my time playing with the extruder but didn’t produce anything I would bother repeating. So what do I do with this pile of scrap I have just produced? What else but swirl lentil beads. They haven’t been baked yet but here they are. Scrap...

Having sanded and buffed a load of beads by hand last week I decided to try buffing with a dremel. I wanted to get a really shiny buffed finish and I had read that you could only achieve this with mechanical buffing. I only started sanding recently and have  been buffing by hand  on a tea towel . I have never used a dremel before, I am borrowing one from my parents.I tried the dremel buffing wheel (sewn muslin one that comes with the Dremel)...