polymer clay – CharmMe Studio

Craft time

Posted on September 15, 2020 by Niki

Oh I wish there was more craft time in my life! So apparently full time uni degree, evening college GCSE, 3 days a week volunteering for my degree placement, 2 primary aged children and lots of pets (including the girls pony) isn’t enough for me and today I started a role as a lunchtime supervisor at a school. Part of me is screaming ‘what was I thinking’ but I have to say that I really enjoyed it. I absolutely love working with children (my degree is a learning and teaching degree as I am wanting be a primary school teacher) and even though I am a mature student I am actually really enjoying my degree and GCSE course as well.

The only things that I worry about with everything is if I am giving my girls enough time and also I have very little time for my own crafting. What this does mean is that any time I do have I really treasure, with both the girls and crafting. I did manage to get a few minutes to craft earlier in the week and had a play with some polymer clay.

These are the colours that I used: Citrine, Rose quartz and Peppermint

I started out wanting to make some swirly beads and then decided to have a go at making some swirl lentil beads, I ended up using 2 tutorials and as both of them have some really good tips. The tutorials that I used are as follows: TurtleSoup Beads https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HM-u_8lGb8&t=43s and Polymer clay tutor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3xzjScyjSw and both are worth a watch.

I love the way the beads came out and because I wanted to make one a little more interesting for a focal bead I decided to add a little flower. I still need to put some holes in and then hopefully I will make them into a necklace.

I hope you like them and thank you for reading, I would love to hear what you think of them.

Niki x

Family crafting time

Posted on September 2, 2020 by Niki

The girls and I managed to get in some crafting before the girls went back to school last week, we decided had a play with polymer clay. Youngest D (8 yrs old) and myself had a go at making some swirl cane following a tutorial by TurtleSoup Beads. I absolutely love Susans tutorials as she takes a very laid back approach and shows tips and tricks along the way. I always feel like it doesn’t matter how it goes I will end up with something awesome at the end even though I am a beginner and make mistakes. You can find the swirl cane tutorial here: https://youtu.be/oUdSo_DUm5I

Our colour choices, mine on the left and Youngest Ds on the right.

Youngest D is into Marvel (Ironman mainly) and this was a factor in her colour choice while I went for a more random colour choice. We used a clay cutter to get the pieces the same size to start with and then cut them down depending on how much of each colour we wanted in the finished blend. We then shaped the piece into tear drops as we were only using small amounts of clay and stacked them together to put the pasta machine and get the colour gradient happening. If you haven’t done blends before TurtleSoup beads has a brilliant tutorial on the process here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwUClASdMOY&t=88s

Colour blends, or skinner blends as they are called, are still new to me and I am happy with the results that we got from these pieces. I should add that we are using a cheap set of clay that I bought off the internet. I do have Fimo but for this experiment we decided to use some of the this clay.

We then followed the rest of the tutorial for how to roll the clay and Youngest D wanted to add some silver foil to the outside of the cane as she loves a bit of sparkle.

We were both really pleased with the finished canes and I loved the different colours that we managed to create using the same technique but different colours. We ended up with 2 very different canes and now we are planning what we are going to use the canes for.

Have you tried skinner blends or canes? what are your go to colours? We would love to hear your comments on our canes or comments about the blog so far.

Thank you for reading

Niki x

Some pieces so far!

Posted on August 17, 2020 by Niki

Having outlined what I am hoping to achieve with this blog I thought I should actually get on with the fun part of sharing a few of the pieces that I have made so far.

The above paperweights were made for my girls after I had created a tutorial on how to seal paper stickers for use in resin. The girls chose the stickers that they wanted and the colour themes along with embellishments. The fox is filled with glitter and sparkle, including sparkly butterflies, while the birds have some additional polymer clay leaves in.

I absolutely loves these pieces! My Eldest daughter and I made these cute little Dinos (mine is the green one) following a tutorial from the very talented Creative Rachy.

Link to tutorial: https://youtu.be/WFfzjh2bVpQ

My youngest daughter made the awesome dragon using a picture she found on google, I am sorry I don’t know who the artist is so can’t give credit. But both girls did an amazing job and added their own flare into the designs.

I will be adding more of our makes and more detailed information on new makes as we do them. I hope you like our projects and I will be back soon with more.

Niki x

What is to follow….

Posted on August 17, 2020August 17, 2020 by Niki

Family owl frame made for a very special family using polymer clay.

Credit: Owls were made following a tutorial by Just Handmade and can be found here: https://youtu.be/0A5IlLrXdVc

When I first picked the name for this site I had planned to make charms using resin and polymer clay. That idea has already started evolving and I have lots of ideas of items I wish to make and share. The idea for this blog is to share my passion for crafting and to keep a record of my journey along with any hints or tips of what I have learnt along the way.

I will update my blog as often as I am able however I am sure you can appreciate that with 2 children and studying for a degree and GCSE I don’t get time to make every day. I will however endeavour to update every time I get the opportunity to have a play.

I am hoping to cover all sorts of crafts and mediums and also include some of my children’s crafting adventures as well. What better way to motivate them and have a record of how far they have come than getting the see it on the intern. I do alway ask permission from my girls before posting anything about them on social media.

I am not a professional and I do not believe that there is only one way to do anything. I will be sharing what I have done and if it has worked or not for me. We all find our own ways of doing things and as long it is safe and we enjoy it everything is good.

I hope you enjoy our adventures and I look forward to sharing our journey with you. Please comment with any positive ideas or suggests or anything you would like us to try.

Thank you for reading.

Niki x