Into the New Year

Over the brief holiday I had this year (oh do I wish it was longer!)  I was messing around with my clay and trying my hand at some of the things I'd seen online ... no, I wasn't feeling overly orignal by any stretch of the imagination... and I tried making one of those beads I'd found in my Flickr roamings.... only smaller and well a bit more mashed up than the original I'd come across.

Here is a ball of some old scrap clay that I figured would work well
as my shape when I placed the coils of clay around it to make the bead

Using the Extruder I got for Christmas I made a nice coil of purple
and wrapped it around the scrap clay I had.  I then flipped it over
as I'd put a hole in the top and made it a bit bigger to fit
the clay I planned on putting in it.

  

I had thought of trying my hand at making them beads, but I just haven't quite got the knack of making them without squishing the bottom of one end as I wrap around the coil.  So I decided to make it a little plant pot instead.  Why?  Because I'd been on the hunt for some miniature flower pots, and I did find some online but at this time I can't be ordering new things online (money, money) and so I decided to use the resources I had and improvise.



My improvised tree that I made out of my bead



I'm not sure how easy it is to see what I did here, as I've got a bit of "stuff" in the background of this shot, but I liked how it turned out, so much in fact I tried my hand at another bead and made a twisted up little plant with flowers sticking out of it.



A little potted plant with some funky pink flowers



Pretty little tree and potted plant



It was fun to do and I really felt free when I was making the little plant.  I don't know if free is quite the right word to use, but I felt relaxed and felt like I was really in my element and enjoying the moment.

So much so... you can see in the background some little birds I'd made.  Inspired by some creations by JooJoo (who does great work!)



Little birdies

I just felt liberated and enjoyed the moment of just being able to create and not getting frustrated because something didn't look right.   Actually it went rather smoothly all in all... lol.  I think I'll make some more little plants because I had so much fun making the two I've shown you.  I don't know, one minute I want to make miniature foods and the next I want to make cute little plants and animals, jewelery and mastering how to make a Skinner blend.  SIGH!!!!  It's coming together, and the thing that is most definite is that I'll have a hard time getting bored with clay... too much to get into!