WOYWW #474: Playing with air-drying clay (again)

WOYWW is upon us once again, so it's time to share our crafty desks. I walked into my art room yesterday morning to be greeted with this scene: Oreo had taken a shine to my scrap box and took up residence in it.

As you can see the evidence on my desk, I've been playing with air-drying clay and made some tiles and embellishments by pressing stamps and metal filigrees into wet clay. These are a bit wonky - air-drying clay will always have a more organic and rustic feel to it than polymer clay and that's part of its appeal to me (plus the fact that it's much cheaper!).

I've also experimented with moulding air-drying clay. Here's a medallion I made using one of my home-made moulds.

I made the mould using silicone putty and a large metal charm years ago. You can find the original post here. It was meant to be used as a stamp, but it works just as well as a mould. I always think some of these charms are too good to use in a single project and never again and this way you can reproduce the design as many times as you want.

Another advantage of air-drying clay is that you can mould it to curved surfaces and just let them dry, which you can't do with polymer clay. Using a bit of gel medium, it will permanently bond to the surface as well. Here's an altered jar I made earlier in the week using air-drying clay in commercially available moulds. (It's an empty marmite jar, in case you're wondering!) 

Here's another picture of Oreo, lazing around trying to stay cool in this heat. There was a nice breeze coming through the window and he made sure that every inch of his tummy was exposed to it.

I forgot to tell you last week that I'm starting a new job on Monday working in a small office 15 hrs per week. This means I can still keep up with my blog, so I'm very happy! I was hoping the weather would turn cooler by then, but it's predicted to heat up even more over the weekend - oh, well, the heatwave won't last forever and we'll think back on it with fondness come January. 

Happy Independence Day to my US visitors! My blogiversary was just two days ago - that's how I always remember! 

And happy #474 to everyone visiting through the Stamping Ground. xx