America........ A week of claying....and I saw a groundhog!!!

What a week. Seven days in the company of a good friend, a good ‘claying’ friend at that, her husband who brought us wine, a cuddly dog, and a whole workshop dedicated to claying; and the most important thing, actually free time to indulge in the claying! As is my way I had a far too large a list of what I wanted to do, and Donna did too, so we were bound to feel a week wasn’t long enough, but what we did do was plant seeds, creative seeds that can be pursued at leisure. I saw a painting of trees and decided that this was what I wanted to do most. So, as I wanted stripy trees I went for a technique taught by the wonderful Debbie Crothers, of making lots of vaneers and cutting them into little strips. I went for main,y yellow, Donna for pinks and purples, and we both went to bed soooooo unhappy with what we had made.

We spent the second day making them into stripes, and wow, we were really pleased with them! Just goes to show, sometimes you just have to have a little faith. After that we played about with backgrounds and back filling, and ended up with something that, although not perfect, has definite potential. I can’t wait to carry on with ‘operation trees’ when I get home.

What else did we work on? Well, my list included a horse cane, a number of new canes to make a turtle, lampwork beads, design a new rose cane, translucent canes, and making a couple of pens. Hmmmm, the horse cane has a mane and one ear so far, we did a number of canes and made a turtle shell, but the rest are for another time. It’s not as if we spent long doing anything else; Al, Donnas husband suggested showing me the beach......I hate beaches and water, and said could we go to Michaels instead. For non Americans, Michaels is an amazing craft shop. We also went to the local dairy farm that sold ice cream. There were so many flavours I had to go four times. It would have been rude not to.
Back to clay (although the walnut and maple ice cream is still in my mind), we looked at painted Mexican wood carvings of animals, look them up on Pinterest, they’re incredible, and a wonderful inspiration for canes. After spending far too long trying to decide which ones we wanted to attempt to make, we ended up with these. This is a photo of them packed ready to bring home.

When I’ve covered the turtle I’ll post a picture. I have a few days once I’m home before I return to work, and I have plans for solid claying!

Everywhere you go there’s clay inspiration. America is wonderful at celebrating holidays, and they have Thanksgiving and Halloween coming up. Nearly every porch has some sort of display, makes great viewing when travelling anywhere. And yes,I was so excited to see so many porches, just like in the American films! Look at the pumpkins in one shop we visited. Those colours!

Spending time at JFK airport gives me time to write the blog, but also I’ve promised Donna that I’ll get onto Instagram. I have absolutely no idea what it is, or why I need it, but I think I’m just kicking against doing any more technical stuff, after all, I am writing a blog, that’s almost surreal! Anyway, she is a great friend, and encourages me to do things out of my comfort zone, so, I promised, so will go look up what it is and how to join. Before I go, just a reminder that everyone who subscribes to this blog (a little box on the top right of this page) will be put in a draw at the end of this week to win a free ticket to the Polymer Clay Adventure 2020.

To find out more about this wonderful adventure where 23 polymer clay artists have put together tutorials of the projects above click on https://gumroad.com/a/40744051 If you register before January, it’s a special discounted price. And don’t forget, a free seat, courtesy of Ilysa and Kira, will go to someone picked randomly from my subscribers. Good luck!