Polymer Clay Play and a Grandchild
Kids, yarn and clay - craft project for grandparents
Rainy/snowy Saturday -nothing to do. Simple instructions from "Ask the Crafter" -a fun craft project with a grandchild or friends. Make cute dolls. A fundraiser?
Our friend Judi W runs a nifty blog for crafters called, Ask the CrafterJudi is a cloth doll maker and designer known to dabble in mixed media. Living in Alaska's interior, she has long, dark winters for crafting and sewing to her heart’s content. Cloth doll making challenges all her crafting skills in one medium. Judi is retired from the military, takes the occasional art class at the local University, teaches locally and on-line, and thoroughly enjoys herself. Here's her quick recipe for charming characters crafted from plastic spoons. It's easy and the whimsical dolls are wonderful.
Spoon Dolls by Judi W.
Here is a great project you can make with your grandkids. My friend Kai sent me a cute little bunny crafted from a plastic spoon so I thought I’d give it a try, too. Here’s what you need for this project:
- Plastic spoons
- Cardboard
- Polymer Clay
- Face molds
- Acrylic craft paints
- Yarns and fabric scraps
Preparation:
Before the kids come over, make the faces. You can find commercial face molds at craft shops. Just get a block of Sculpey or other polymer clay and condition until soft (which means squish it repeatedly or put it through a pasta machine dedicated to clay). Put a little water into the face mold and then shake it out (this is the release agent). Now press the clay into the mold. If you have a flexible mold, flex the mold carefully to pop the face out. Then bake following manufacturer's directions. Cool completely and they're ready to paint.
The rest of the story:
To create a half-figure, just the head and shoulders of a character, I cut a piece of cardboard and covered the bowl of the spoon (glue it on). I glued the face on over the cardboard covered-bowl. Next, I fashioned a turban-shaped hat by glueing a 4 inch circle of fabric to the back of the head and folding the ends in and up. I wrapped some thin quilt batting around the handle to pad it out. I wrapped that with fabric strips and yarn so it was nice and wide. Then I added a bit of ribbon at the ‘neck’ of the spoon for a turtleneck collar. For the shirt or blouse - I cut another 4” fabric circle, cut a small neck hole, gluing rough edges under, and slipped the circle up the spoon’s handle. Glue it closed. A little embellishment with yarn, beads and a shiny button for a necklace pendant, and it was done. Add a loop of yarn to the back of the spoon so you can hang it up. Here's my Johnny Carson ‘Carnac’. Lots of fun!
You can always just cover the whole spoon with various yarns, add googly eyes, and keep it simple, depending on the skill level of your grandchildren.
