Today we made a clay/dough that can be baked or air dried.

Mix together 2 cups of flour, 1 cup of salt , 2 Tablespoon of oil and 1 to 1 1/2 cups of cold water.

We used this dough to make a few beads among other things.

We rolled the beads and then gently threaded them onto skewers and laid them on a foil lined tray.

We baked them at 300 degrees for almost an hour. bake until they are hard.

After they cooled we painted them with acrylic paints.

Once the paint dries you can put a coat of clear shellac or acrylic.

Molly also made a small box to hold her beads.

These can also be air dried for 48hrs.

A funny story about these beads:  when Jake was little and we made these, he walked out the back door to get into the car and our stupid dog-not our smart dog-jumped up and ate the beads right off of Jakes neck.  I drove around for years with a half strung necklace of those beads in my ashtray waiting to be fixed.  Moral of that story I guess is keep these beads away from your dumb dogs as they are sure to think they are treats.  But your smart dogs will know better!  Or at least they will wait till your not looking.

We dragged out the really heavy tub of real clay. Not play dough, not modeling clay, not sculpey or plasticine, but real clay. It is so different than the others. It is real! We bought ours a long time ago-if properly wrapped  the clay will not dry out and will last a long time. Check your local phonebook for a place near by that sells clay.

It is a little hard at first but unlike modeling clay, it will become a bit more pliable, but then it dries out. Having a bit of water nearby to wet your fingertips is a good idea.  Yet, you don’t want to soak the clay either.

You can add some tools if you want or not. We used a mallet, roller, butter knives, among a few others.

Molly is our resident expert in all things clay. She has been taking hand building and pottery wheel classes for about 5 years now. She worked with a chunk for a while, then pounded it flat, then rolled it then cut shapes out with a knife. She used wet fingers as glue and to make the clay more pliable.

I suggested we make some pinch pots but they had other plans. That was fine, maybe next time. It has been awhile since we have had the clay out so they just wanted to mess round. She made a table, chairs and a highchair-and some people too.

Ginger mad a few things too, and put hers in the sun to dry. This clay is a lot about process and not product-unless you have an experienced participant and they have played with the clay many times before or if your younger child sees your older child making a particular something. Really this clay is an experience-to squeeze, pound, poke and smash.

We will air dry our clay pieces because our kiln is not working. Air dried pieces are not as strong and will not hold water. This is a great outside activity. It can get messy but it all washes off. Also, you do not want to let any clay go down your drain -hand washing is OK but no chunks or sludge! They worked with the clay for almost 2 hours this afternoon. It was very relaxing for all of us!

Well they were wrong-it didn’t rain.

It was another beautiful day.

So I didn’t get much done in the house again.

But this evening we did follow the artful parents nature prints idea. I bought some sculpey clay and rolled each block into four balls. Then with various bits and pieces of nature; leaves, sea shells, flowers, pine needles, nuts that we collected in the yard we made prints. We laid the bit or piece of nature down and placed the ball of sculpey on top of it and pushed down really hard. We then carefully peeled the object away.

These looked great before we baked them I followed the 250 degree oven for 45 mins recommendation but thought they looked a bit overdone.

I just so happened to have the perfectly cool, little, thrifted, watch boxes from India, to hold these.

These only cost a quarter by the way!!! This was a great easy no mess activity, that we will surely do again. Next time I think I may make holes in them before baking them and make a mobile with some sticks and twine.

No matter what the weather is tomorrow, it’s our busy day so the poor house will be neglected again. Maybe Friday.

If you read my first entry you will notice that I said my almost 9 year old daughter, Molly, is crazy crafty. Well, what I mean is, she sees things in a different way. She creates odd things and has interesting ideas and understands things differently. I have been told that she is dyslexic. Maybe. But certainly her mind works in a different way. This was apparent very early on. We often asked her, “What planet are you from?” when she was little. She really loves clay and sculpture and 3-D work and just recently crocheting.

Last night she told me she was making up her own stitch and when she woke up this morning I found her crocheting in her bed. Soon she came out to show me this:

Now keep in mind not only did she make up a new stitch that I am told goes–Chain 1, wrap around, go in the hole, drop your loop, go through two and go through two. But she can’t read a pattern so she made the bag pattern up as she went along! She just recently learned how to crochet! I am amazed at this girl. She has the gift!

Feeling bloggers block. It must be all the rain. Or just plain tired. Every other Tuesday we run from 9:30 to 5:00. We have pre-school, circus, art class and clay class–All over town! But in the middle of all that running, I get to enjoy the most delicious hot chai with soy milk and time with a few of my favorite friends. It makes that long day something to look forward to!

The block also may be due to the fact that www.sundayswithstretchypants.com mentioned something like, “So are you ready for two for Tuesday this week?” I don’t ever remember saying I was going to make that a weekly thing. Oh, the pressure. I’ll try my best.

Ginger wanted to string some beads this morning. This was an easy request and not at all messy! Keep in mind bigger beads with bigger holes are easier to string for younger kids. Also the stiffer the string the easier to string. Pipecleaners make a good “first string” as well as nylon shoe laces and yarn that has tape wrapped tightly around the end to make it like the end of a shoe lace. I know there is a name for that piece of plastic on the end of the lace, but it escapes me at the moment.
Also, tying a bead at the end of the string or taping it down to the table keep the beads from falling back off the end.-so there is one!

As for the second idea-I promised I would link to some good books. Well I don’t know how to do that so I will just list a few titles I picked up at the library the other day.

1. The Essential Alexander Calder by Howard Greenfeld—–I love The Essential series. They are small, loaded with color photos and illustrations, and just the right amount of information about the artist.

#’s 2, 3 and 4 are examples of my strewing. I love to look at books. I often leave books out to serve as inspiration and spring boards for questions and projects. I leave them in odd and out in the open places-The car, the bathroom, the kitchen table, the window seat.

2. Symphonic Poem The Art of Aminah Brenda Lynn Robinson–hopefully a trip to the Art Museum will follow this soon!

3. Found Object Art by Dorthy Spencer–I have sooo many ideas after looking through this book.

4. Do Not Open by John Farndon——-So packed with cool info and pictures you have to check it out!

And then there were two!!!

This was an easy idea-Play Clay made with cornstarch. It felt similiar to homemade playdough but not as sticky. It did have a bit of a scent that my 3 year old kept saying, “That smells bad.” But it didn’t keep her from playing with it.

I love the color we chose to add-a greenish-blue

And because I am a sucker for all things bright and sparkley

We used glitter, foil, metallic pipe cleaners and brightly colored mylar and craft sticks.

Ginger decided to wrap her “ski race” in foil and let it dry.

Incase you don’t have the recipe on the back of your cornstarch: I doubled this recipe and had to fiddle a bit to get it to the right consistency
1 cup salt
1/3 cup water
1/2 cup cornstarch
1/4 cup cold water
food coloring
mix salt and 1/3 cup water over med heat stirring occasionally-3 to 4 minutes
remove from heat; add cornstarch and 1/4 cup of water add food coloring. Mix. It will thicken as it cools. (I had to add more cornstarch at this point and put back on stove-it was not thickening) knead on cornstarch dusted surface. Be carful it will be HOT. Keep adding cornstarch till no longer sticky. Store in fridge in a sealed container with a damp sponge.

Hey look! My kids are in the circus!!
This afternoon my kids had 2 performances at Gingers preschool. Then Molly had to go to her clay class. Whew!

OK I finished 6 minutes shy of Wednesday-so it really was a two for Tuesday!!