Fast Clay Jewelery

It's not really clay, it's polymer clay. the difference: I'm not sure, but this stuff has colors!!!! and it bakes in a normal oven. this project takes about one weekend, but can take longer if you have distractions (much longer).

polymer clays
-gold
-silver
-white
-two complementary colors (explained in step 3)
-scrap

-fishing line or string
-small mono colored beads
-metal wire
-other beads

-toothpicks
-glue stick for a hot glue gun
-pliers
-polymer clay blade (it has nothing to stop it from the top, so it can cut through tall blobs)
-pasta machine or rolling pin

Take a ball of clay (I chose orange, like gold), roll it into a ball, roll it some more, roll it into a snake (or log/cane, depending on how you want), and repeat until the clay feels warm and easy to mould. This is called conditioning. You must do it before you work clay, or your clay will be hard and will crumble.

Using the pasta machine (or rolling pin) roll out a flat sheet of the clay (above). Cut it into the largest rectangle possible.

Do the same for its complementary color (red-green/purple-yellow/blue-orange). make sure you cut off a a bit of the second sheet (the one on top). your cinnamon roll won't work if you don't.

roll the sheets together, starting from the part that you took off a bit from.

take some white clay, condition it, and roll it out in the pasta machine. Condition some gold clay, and roll it out into a snake. wrap the gold in the white, trimming a bit after the white meets itself. These are the "petals". Take the cinnamon roll from last step, cut it in half, and place the petals around it. You might have to make more petals.

take some of what's left of the cinnamon roll, and roll it out so it becomes thinner. Get a log of the complementary color, roll it out to the same thickness and trim it down to the same length. Then do the same thing, but in silver. stack the three logs so they form a pyramid, and roll them together. cut this log into several parts (try for under four), and do the same thing.

WARNING
do not over work it!!!!!
you will end up with one blob, usually khaki green

roll out a log of gold and silver. then roll out a sheet of black. Cut the sheet into a rectangle. cut this rectangle into three equal pieces. trim both snakes (above) to fit the sheets. roll them in the sheets like the petals in step two.

Roll out a log of each color half the length of the other logs. Milefiore these colors until you are happy with the effect. roll it in the third black sheet. Now, using a glue stick for glue guns, flatten out these three logs to form an isosceles triangle.
poke a hole near the base of each one for the string. lay them flat on a baking tray with foil paper and bake according to instructions on package.

take the bead from step 1, cut it in half. take the bead from step 2 and cut it to the same size. do the same thing to the bead from step 3.

take the beads from steps 1 and 3 and place them behind the bead from step 2 (like in the picture). Pinch the bead from step 3 on the top to get it to fit better (like in the picture). use black to fill in the gaps. NOTE: you now should have a block of bead. Use the glue stick to make it a better square. Cut off slices and lay them out flat. Use the pasta machine to roll out a sheet of scrap clay. place a toothpick on top of the side of the bead that you want to be the top, and place a piece of the scrap on top of the toothpick. using another toothpick, fuse the scrap to the bead. make sure the toothpick can move from the crap bandage and the bead.

the mega bead already has one (the bandage of scrap). The tooth bead has one (the hole). all that are left are the petal beads, the cinnamon roll, and the millefiore bead. For the petal bead, take some metal wire, use the pliers to make a loop at the top, and bend it like in the picture, to make a hooky thingy. attach a bandage out of scrap to secure the pin to the bead. For the millefiore bead, make a loop with the pliers and make a ninety degree bend. Insert this into the bead, and, after baking, bend as in the third picture. For the cinnamon roll and any other flat beads without a hole, do the same as for the mega bead.

get out the small mono colored beads, and take the color(s) you want (mine had many colors). collect all of the beads you would like in your necklace. take some metal wire and bend it to form the first part of the clasp (first image), and the second part of it (second image). take the fishing wire, cut it slightly longer than the length required, and tie two granny knots (the one you do after tightening on your laces to tie a shoe) around the first part of the clasp. For necklaces: thread the monocolored beads on it until they reach the spot where you would like to start adding colored ones (about where your ear begins). now thread the beads on however you like. I would recommend that necklaces be symmetrical. (picture of the necklace in the third picture).

If you want to make the jewelry more elaborate, you can add several additional "layers" to spots (only for vertical hanging jewelry, like necklaces). i have two diagrams (drawn by me) to show you how to do it. the one with the words few is for when you have one layer, and many is for when you have a lot and it will be worth the extra time and double threading. (the last photo is of the necklace from above with a "few" layer).