Dallas: Sunday Polymer Clay
Sunday in Dallas, I taught my Polymer Clay class for Fiber Folk. We mostly talk about techniques that would work well for buttons, although folks can use them for other things (buttons, shawl pins, hair sticks, pens, crochet hooks) as well. In polymer clay, there are a lot of high-contrast techniques that are impressive but they work less well for blending into a sweater or jacket than faux wood or
ivory/layering techniques. I focus on the more subtle techniques for this class when working with knitters/crocheters, because of this.
I had eight folks signed up for this one, which was about maximum capacity for the kitchen area I was assigned (because of access to the toaster oven I needed). Polymer clay class is always exciting. It is fascinating to see how folks using different colors in the same techniques can turn out such different works.
One woman had made a lovely soft felt shawl the day before. She made very lightweight buttons to embellish the felt piece.
Another student had purchased a whole set of polymer clay working tools (including rubber stamps) at a garage sale and she expermented with those as she worked. Esther was given some wooden coffee stirrer sticks and carved them into points on one end, and made them into hair sticks. Several folks covered pens and/or crochet hooks. It was a prolific time. Esther even worked through her lunch hour (actually 2 hours) and really got a lot of clay worked. It was a wonderful time.
I took photos of some of the trays that came out of the oven. Also see Esther wearing her new hair sticks, straight out of the oven!
Sunday after all the classes were done, we said quick goodbyes to Margo Lynn, Mary Kay and Jerry. Molly was a great sport and trucked Lily and Melody and me to dinner at a sort of French-food eatery where we sat in the corner and decompressed, talked, laughed, told stories and generally wound ourselves down from the fun weekend.
Lily had been scheduled to fly out on Sunday night… but as New York was having major weather troubles, her flight was cancelled and she was rescheduled for Monday morning. We all moved to a hotel closer to the airport fot one night and Melody and I talked until all hours again. Great fun.
Monday was to be goodbye time for we instructors… Lily and Melody would head home in the morning. I had never been to Dallas before, and since I like to “collect cities” I had planned a day of adventure into my trip plans. I was looking forward to it…
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:06 am
People are so creative!
Have a fabulous time in NYC.
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:17 am
Fascinating! All the different shapes and color choices.. its making my fingers itch!
June 30th, 2007 at 12:37 am
Some beautiful textures and colors in the clay!