I promised someone last week that the thing I was in the middle of making at that time, would cause a smile. And I hope that these two handmade cards do that very thing.
Can you imagine receiving a card, out of the blue, for your Birthday; to cheer you up; or just to say ‘hello’, opening it and finding this funny little dog inside…
That little chap looks like he’s kicking up the grass after he’s had a tinkle, doesn’t he? LOL!
Camera at a slightly different angle so that you can see this really is a card.
I took the next photo to give you a side view, so that you could get a true idea of how much the back-end of this little chap stands proud of the card…
And then . . . well . . . I just had to make a taller, shaggy coated white dog – which I based upon a ‘Dulux Dog’ – or – an ‘Old English Sheepdog’, as they’re actually called. . .
. . . and from a slightly different angle . . .
The photographs sadly don’t really show the detail of the coats – the ‘shaggyness’ which I’ve sculpted in. The bodies look far more ‘hairy’ looking in real life – to the natural eye.
Another photo to show the depth of the clay dog.
And finally . . . a paws for thought . . .
. . . I forgot to take a shot of their feet, so dashed back to the craft room to take an extra photo. The photograph above shows the pinky feet of the white dog, and you can just about see that the brown woofer has pinky brown feet. But what the photo doesn’t pick up is that each paw has individual pads– just as a real dog does. In this case, each pad has one large central pad, and three little smaller pads around the front of the paw.
I think if I were sent one of these cards, for whatever reason, after displaying it as a card should be displayed, I’d frame it afterwards and hang it on the wall. It’s way too much fun to go into a drawer!
Now I’m very aware that not everyone is a dog person, so I gave some thought to what Cat people might enjoy . . . and [whispering]. . . “shhhh . . . something is in the pipeline for those people who love cats! Coming very, verysoon!
Thank you so much for coming for a visit, and for sharing a coffee moment with me. I hope you found a smile or two looking at the Waggy Tails!
It’s really lovely to see you, and even more lovely to ‘hear’ your comments and chat, so please, do let me know you’ve visited.
Have a truly blessed rest of your day, my lovely blogging friends!
Cobweb the Cobbler is the Shoemaker to Elves, Fairies and all in the Land of the Fae, and inside this tiny box are a pair of shoes that the esteemed Cobbler is secretly rather proud of.
Made for a young, sweet, impish, dis-orderly, tousled haired and ever so slightly rumpled, teenage, 140 years old Fairy who recently discovered that she kind of likes the Goth scene – only without the grumpy bits. She has the blackest of black hair, which, if she’d only stop back-combing it, would be long, sleek and shiny. She has a variety of fairy wings – but does favour her black insect wings which were found among the autumn leaves last year and fashioned into fairy wings by Drucilla herself.
She wears (mostly) her much-loved, slightly raggedy, black Fairy tutu, teamed with her very most favourite top in the whole world – a cream and black stripe top with long sleeves which droop down onto her hands. The sleeves are just loose enough for her to hide her fairy wand up them, but tight enough to hold the wand there safely.
Onto her top she pins the thing she’s known for best …. a red rose brooch pin which was made for her by her Grandmother. Whatever she’s wearing, whatever the day, time, or occasion, she is never seen without that red rose.
But… she was in need of some special shoes for her ‘look’ to be complete, so Cobweb the Cobbler came up with an idea, and the Drucilla Penny Red Rose Fairy Shoes were born.
The tiny 2″ long shoes were rather difficult to photograph, – you see … they’re actually the darkest of black, but they have a very special silver dust finish to them which makes them twinkle madly – however the camera has picked up that shimmery twinkle and made the shoes look as if they’re a steel grey. They aren’t. They’re truly black!
They have a gold, hand-made buckle on the front, and red roses on a vine which winds its way around the shoes.
On the edges of the shoes, just where Drucilla puts her feet into them, are round, amber glass beads on golden wires, which arch gracefully outwards, with the amber beads loosely suspended from them so that the amber glass ‘tinkles’ and makes the most wonderful sound as they move against each other when the shoes are worn. (Imagine a small bag of coins being gently shaken – but then turn the sound down so that it’s really gentle and only just audible. That’s the closest I can get to describing the sound!).
Drucilla Penny loves her new shoes and can’t stop looking at them. Pausing over ponds and lakes so that she can admire her shoes in the reflection in the water. Aw, bless her heart.
Where Did Drucilla Penny get her name from?
Many years ago I was a big Carpenters fan and had almost all of their records. One of the songs on one of their albums was a fabulous little bit of fun called ‘Druscilla Penny’, and it was this song which I was singing to myself as those fairy shoes (above) were being fashioned. Once finished, I decided that they’d have to be for a fabulous fairy called Drucilla Penny (different spelling), in honour of the song. And that’s how the Fairy Shoes came to ‘be’.
I found a video of Richard and Karen Carpenter singing the song and I did originally put the video here, but I found it was (for some reaon) attracting tons of spam messages, apparently from some very odd WordPress blog sites, so I’ve removed the video. But if you visit youtube and put ‘Carpenters’ and Druscilla Penny’ in the search bar there, it will give you a choice of a couple of videos you can watch and listen to.
Lyrics – so that you can sing along if you’re in the mood!
Druscilla Penny, what a name Are you sure you didn’t make it up yourself? Youre very pretty, yes you are But with all the junk you wear, its hard to tell
Man you must work hard to get your hair to look like that I don’t need a horoscope to tell me where you’re at Your family’s probably given up on you Since you began to follow groups of long-haired rock ‘n’ rollers I can hear your mother crying for her daughter
Druscilla Penny, what a girl Where’s the purpose to the crazy life you lead? It doesn’t matter after all You’re so sure that instant love is all you need
I’ve seen your face at least a thousand times You’re always standing there behind the stages at the concerts Waiting for an offer to be with someone after
Druscilla Penny, how’s your head? Do you ever wake up lonely in the night? It isn’t easy for a girl when she can’t decide if love is wrong or right I hope I live to see a change, could you ever really love? Ever really care? Ever really get it together? No.
Thank you for coming to visit my blog, and for taking a look into the fabulous world of Fairy Shoes. I loved making these shoes. They’re so detailed, and I really love those little details in art works – whatever they’re made from! Hope you like them too.
Have a wonderful weekend, and a truly blessed rest of your day!
Did you know… that a Wand isn’t in the least bit magical?It can’t do a thing. It has absolutely NO power. NOTHING. Let me explain more . . .
All a wand actually is, is a ‘tool’ on which to focus your attention. Believe me, if wands themselves really could do ‘stuff’ all on their own, I certainly wouldn’t collect the pretty wands which I do! (or any other sort of wand for that matter!).
Let me take you back to your school days. Imagine for a moment that you’re sat in the classroom, and you’re giggling and whispering with the girl next to you. Suddenly the teacher’s voice BOOMS out, and shouts your name! You look up and see him standing there, with a cross face, hands on hips. He looks right at you, gives you a stern telling off and tells you that you’re disrupting his class.
Embarrassing eh?
Now let’s replay that scene again . . .
The teacher’s voice BOOMS out, and shouts your name! You look up and see your teacher standing there pointing his index right at you. He’s looking very cross. Looking directly at you but still pointing his finger at you, shaking it the merest amount, he raises his voice and tells you off, – all the time he’s doing this he continues to point that finger at you.
Can you see (and feel) how much more ‘menacing’ the whole scene becomes simply because he’s pointing his finger at you?
That finger doesn’t have anything magical about it, and yet it seems to hold so much more ‘power’.
That’s exactly the same as a wand. All a finger pointing at you is doing is focusing your attention. (and the person who’s pointing at you’s attention). A wand is exactly the same thing. It just focus’ the attention.
Well now I’ve blathered on about how wands don’t have any power, you can perhaps now understand why they don’t ‘freak’ me out, and even why I love to make pretty, magical to the eye, wands! And this ‘Rope a Star’ wand is magical to the eye.
The inspiration for this wand came from my childhood. My mother used to tell me a poem, song, or story (I sadly can’t remember which) when I was little, but I do remember that I loved it. Sadly I cannot remember what the story, song, poem was – and my mother has passed on, so I can’t ask her about it – but I remember a line from it which went something like: ‘I’ll throw a rope out and rope a star just for you’ … and that line conjured up such wonderful images inside my little mind, and it still does now.
So I decided that I would throw a rope out and rope a star – but this time I’d make mine a rope which wrapped itself around a wand, and the stars would hang from the wand itself.
There are little silver stars which dangle from lot’s of places on the wand, and there’s a crescent moon with stars hanging from the heel of the wand (at the top end as you’re looking at it in the photo. The ribbon and star cuff around the top of the wand is removable.
Over the years I’ve tried to find the poem, song or story which mentions this ‘roping in a star’ and I’ve never found it. But if you happen to know it or know where to find it, I’d be thrilled if you could either let me know or pop a link into a comment so that I could go and find it.
Have a truly blessed rest of your day, all, . . . and a fabulously twinkly, star lit night.
No matter how many photographs I took, where I took the photographs or what backgrounds I tried it against, I couldn’t seem to capture the real essence of this beautiful wand at all. So although the pictures are OK – they’re not the best that they could be. (apologies. – I’m great at ‘making’, but I pose absolutely no threat to David Bailey).
Where I live I have some huuuuge pine trees in my garden which are protected (by law). So it makes sense to use the wood which these trees gift to me by way of high winds etc.
The base which this wand is made from is beautiful pine, which was seasoned naturally and turned from a small broken branch, into a fabulously straight length of pine wood by a friend – who doesn’t use machinery(wood lathes and such) – everything he does is done the good old-fashioned way – which I love.
Measuring 14½” (or 37cm) from the tip to the heel of the wands handle. But not heavy. I know in the photographs it looks like it would be an arm breaker – but it really is very light – weighing just 60 grams – (or 2 ounces in good old-fashioned money). Every time I pick it up it still surprises even me – and I worked with/on it for weeks!
I knew that I wanted to base the wands handle around the Element of Fire, so began working by choosing my colours of clay. Obviously in shades of reds and yellows – both to represent the heat and the colour of flames, – and, because I wanted fiery flames to lick up and along the wand, I had to blend the colours carefully so that they didn’t become muddy – but blended together just as real flames do.
I also added green oak leaves. This was because I wanted to:
To represent a new beginning; a fresh start; new life;and the seasons;
To honour the Green Manwho’s wisdom is of the eternal truths, cycles and passages. The cycle of birth, growth, death and rebirth. He teaches us the sacred truths of nature. He is a magical bridge between nature and ourselves. From the Green Man we learn the mysteries of all growing things, and he is present in all things green and growing. His energy fills the trees which make the oxygen we breathe.
To acknowledge the mystic energy of nature and vegetation;
And also to give a nod to the Land of the Fae.Since the colour green is a faerie colour, I believe they (the Fae) share an affinity with the Green Man, and here in the British Isles faeries are also known as ‘Greenies’ or ‘Greencoats’.
As I fashioned, I became aware of a growing desire to include gems and crystals of significance, so had to ensure that I took care to place these in just the right places so that the stones didn’t interfere with the comfortable holding of the wand in the hand.
Once the wand and it’s handle had gone through its various own ‘fires‘ (of the making variety) – I polished the handle to a lovely smooth finish and added some very tiny glass beads and an assortment of crystals, fixing them along the curves and folds of the flames along the handle – which helped to represent that ‘sparking, sparkling, crackling’ which a true fire has.
I then tipped the wand with gold leaf. It doesn’t want to show up in the photographs – despite me trying a gazillion photographs [sigh] – so you’ll have to imagine that the very point of the wand is tipped in gold leaf which has a fabulous shine and depth.
Finally – I sat for a while and selected what I felt where the right gem stones to add to this wand. I wanted the colours I was choosing to have a specific meaning and also wanted the gem stones themselves to be chosen for the meaning they held, for the many and varied reasons from feng shui through celtic, wiccan, spiritual healing lore, philosophers and mystics all the way to a gentleman called George Frederick Kunz – (who wrote the book The Curious Lore of Precious Stones published in 1913). Kunz wasn’t a mystic crystal-gazer but rather the leading gemologists of his time and the resident gem expert at Tiffany & Co.
Finding the right mix of gemstones and colours was a balancing act – I wanted to get the mix just right. When I was finally happy with my choice, I had: Carnelian. Yellow Jade, Black Onyx, milky green Malachite, Amethyst and Citrine, sat on my work bench, waiting for me to begin work.
The colours symbolize:
Yellow= Wisdom, Joy, Happiness
Black = Self Control & Resilience. Black stones have protective healing energies.
Green = Life, nature, fertility, self-respect & well-being. Green contains the powerful energies of nature.
Purple= Royalty, magic and mystery. The colour of good judgement & of people seeking spiritual fulfilment. Purple is a good colour to use in meditation.
White= White is purity and cleanliness and the complete energy of light. It stands for wholeness and completion.
Carnelian was chosen because: (amongst many reasons:) Carnelian is associated with the element of fire and it has a projective energy that balances all forces. Carnelian holds a very special place in the Christian religion. According to holy scriptures, carnelian was one of the twelve gemstones worn on the breastplate of Aaron, the first high priest of the Israelites and a prophet.
Yellow Jade was chosen because: Jade is said to bless whatever it touches, serving mankind across the globe for nearly 6,000 years, and valued for its beauty and powers of healing and protection. It is the ultimate “Dream Stone,” revered in ancient cultures, as well as today, to access the spiritual world, gain insight into ritualistic knowledge, encourage creativity, and dream-solve. Jade signifies wisdom gathered in tranquility, dispelling the negative and is the stone of calm in the midst of storm.
Black Onyx was chosen because: it is said to have protective properties and to bring inner strength, self-confidence aid intuition and help with mental discipline, It’s believed to help to release negative emotions and alleviate fear and anxiety. Some cultures believe it to be unlucky, however others consider it to be virtuous and to protect against black magic.
Malachite was chosen because: it is a protection stone, absorbing negative energies, and shows what is blocking your spiritual growth, draws out deep feelings and psychosomatic causes, then allows you to break unwanted ties and outworn patterns. It supports friendships and empathy for other people. NB: Malachite is toxic and should be used only in its polishedform.
Amethyst was chosen because: it is known as a stone of protection. Amethyst is a gemstone often worn by healers, as it has the power to focus energy, and it has long been used to open the spiritual and psychic centers, making it one of the power stones. It’s also known as the Bishop’s Stone and is still worn by Catholic Bishops. The amethyst symbolizes piety, humility, sincerity and spiritual wisdom.
Citrine was chosen because: Citrine is a joyful stone with bright energy which lights up many aspects of lives of those who work with it. It has energies of good fortune and good luck, though these may appear in unexpected ways.. It’s known as the ‘success stone’, since it is believed to promote prosperity and abundance, and because citrine can clear negative energy and influences from the aura, it is useful for meditation, psychic awareness, and spiritual development. Citrine is one of the most valuable and popular gemstones in the quartz group. Citrine also does not absorb any negative energies from its surroundings, and thus never needs energetic clearing..
And that, ladies and gentlemen readers, is the Element of Fire Wand. I hope you like it.
… because even a Fairy has to have shoes! These are Pollens Pods.
Pollen the Fairy has a very important job in the Land of the Fae, and that job is to dust down the flowers after the Bumbles have paid a visit. You see, Bumble Bees can be very messy sometimes and in their desire to collect pollen from flowers, they will occasionally get a little over greedy and splosh tiny specks of pollen all over the flowers and their petals! So Pollen the Fairy was put on the job and he dusts down the flowers with a very special brush, made from the hair of the Fairy Princess. (what? you thought that a bristle brush would do the job? tsk tsk)
But .. Pollen needed new shoes and so wanted Cobweb the Cobbler to make some which had a nod to the important flower dusting job. Cobweb thought long and hard about this and eventually came up with ‘Pods’. The cobbler took some pea pods, and fashioned them into the right shape and correct size, but felt they were the wrong colour.
So the cobbler asked a passing Kingfisher bird if he would be willing to gift one of his beautiful blue feathers to the cobbler. The Kingfisher obliged! – and Cobweb then went to town and, using the feather donated by the Kingfisher, painted the pea pod made shoes!
Slowly, as the cobbler painted – the bright blue colour of the feather began to seep into the green of the pea pod made fairy shoe and dyed it the incredible bright blue colour you see in the photographs!
But … that wasn’t enough!A fairy wouldn’t just have plain blue shoes for hecks sake! No fairy would want just a boring plain shoe! Nooooo. Fairies have to have something special. And that’s where the magic began.
… the front and back, and the back and front!
These fairy shoes are covered in the pollen of all the different coloured flowers which the Bumbles like to visit, and the vines which wind their way around the shoes are there to gently hug the ankles of the fairy wearer so that the shoes don’t fall off in mid-flight, for that would be disastrous!
A comment made by another blogger made me realise that I’d hadn’t shown any of the boxes which the Fairy Shoes arrive in, so I thought that perhaps I should include these boxes in the photographs from now on. So the first photograph(at the top of this post)and the last one (below) show the top (and sides) of the hand painted and decorated box which Cobweb the Cobbler delivers the special Fairy Shoes in.
The other box in the background? ….. Ohhhhh … well you’ll have to wait till next time in order to see the shoes which belong to that box! 😉
Fairy Shoes all hand-made by Cobweb @ The Cobweborium Emporium
This post is dedicated to a fellow blogger, who’s photograph of a Bumble Bee was the inspiration behind this post. You can find her truly beautiful and peace filled blog here: http://friendlyfairytales.com/
Have a blessed rest of your day, and … thank you for visiting and taking the time to read. I hope you like the shoes!
The Round Tower of my Heart a pin / brooch handmade by Cobwebs
This tiny piece of (almost) nothingness was based upon the last few lines of a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Although I’d read the poem before, (way back in my teens), I’d forgotten about it until I opened a book to read one evening and found the ending of the poem at the very start of the book. On the opening page, were these last eight lines of the poem:
I have you fast in my fortress, And will not let you depart, But put you down into the dungeon In the round-tower of my heart.
And there will I keep you forever, Yes, forever and a day, Till the walls shall crumble to ruin, And moulder in dust away!!
Those lines have stayed with me ever since – and I’ve never forgotten them.
It was because of the last four lines of the poem that I decided to make The Round Tower of my Heart pin/brooch.
The Round Tower of my Heart pin.
It’s really quite tiny to look at with the naked eye – at less than an inch at it’s very widest point, and although 2″ tall it looks smaller because of the design. (measurements in the photograph are in centimetres).
I purposely made it with a nod to the more whimsy, but in very dark silvery grey/black, as I wanted it to feel like it was, although a little foreboding and from the depths of somewhere that was dark, actually a quiet, gentle, beautiful place (hence the whimsical beauty of the piece) – but that it was also a place which kept that within its walls a closely guarded secret, and away from the prying eyes of others. Down in the dungeon; in the Round Tower of my Heart.
Thank you so much for visiting, and having a read. I hope the pin brooch is something which holds something for you.
The photograph above doesn’t show the daintiness: the apparent delicacy or the true beauty of this little handmade wand. To see how intricate this really is you need to see it with the human eye, however, I’ve managed to capture a little of the details by taking a ‘closer up’ photograph which helps to show a little more of the adornments. and the fineness, both in the appearance and the work which went into making this incredible little work of heart.
Close up of the Angel Feathers Wand
The wooden part of the wand is made from gifted pine wood, which was crafted by hand, by a wood worker, into a short, beautiful, almost straight length, just right for what I had in my minds eye. Pine was chosen for this wand because it offers the properties of protection, healing, rejuvenation, strength, life, purification and … a wonderful added bonus .. it attracts money! (and I don’t think I know anyone who couldn’t do with a little more of that!)
The handle of the wandwas crafted. Made entirely of individual, handmade white Angel Feathers. Each one is completely different from any other. [Nomould was used in the making of the feathers]. As each feather was made it was transferred to the wand and slowly but surely the handle was born. Gold dust was then applied, with a very fine paint brush, to the tips of all the feathers, in order to give them their own glowing light.
At the head of the handle is a large white pearl, and further pearls can be found dotted throughout the handle, tucked between, or peeping out from beneath various feathers. There are then more pearls which are hung from tiny silver loops hidden within the folds of the feathers, and further tear-drop pearls which hang from little gold chains.
Pearls were chosen for this incredibly special wand both because of their association with the moon, and also because of their symbolism of purity, innocence, faith and honesty.
There are also Opals hung from the handle – a beautiful gemstone, chosen because it’s a stone of inspiration which enhances imagination and creativity. A protective stone; a stone for love; and associated with peace, and consciousness.
In various places on the wand handle there are literally hundreds of the tiniest golden glass beads – which give the appearance of something bubbling forth from beneath the feathers – and the ‘something’ I envisioned that this represented, was love.
The whole wand symbolises love, happiness, warmth, and joy – and in keeping with the traditions of wand making, the wand was blessed and charged, before being passed to its destiny owner.
Thank you so much for coming to read. I really loved making this wonderful little wand and am proud to be known as its maker. I so hope you like it too.
When I’m making something, I usallyhave a certain person in mind, because I find it easier to make the thing if I’m aiming it to appeal to a certain person. It might not be destined to go to that person, but if I have someone in mind who I think would like what I’m making, then it seems [to me] easier to pull the project together. In this instanceI had my mother in mind.
I wanted to make some angel wings – and my magical fingers came up with two pairs – Golden Wings, and Silver Wings. (It has to be magic in my fingers because I’m not talented at all – so it’s obviously just all in my fingers!)
These two pairs of Angel Wings were both difficult to photograph. I’ll freely admit that I’m not the best photographer in the world so photo’s can always be a bit hit and miss when I’m in charge of the camera – but these wings were a REAL challenge to take a picture of.
made by Cobwebs at The Cobweborium Emporium
The colour of the Golden Wings can’t really be seen in the photograph so I’ll try to explain the colour to you; They’re a sort of golden sand colour but with the tiniest of dark flecks in the clay – almost as if I’d added freshly ground pepper. (I hadn’t – it was just the way the mixture of colours which I’d used, turned out.) They’re a much warmer colour than they look, and they make you want to touch them. They’re so tactile. Even the metal post which supports the wings has that feeling about it which makes you want to touch it.
Inserted into the clay (before it went into the oven to be cooked) are three metal golden feathers – which add a little depth and different texture to the wings.
The Silver Wings . . . were more difficult to make as keeping the clay smooth was a nightmare. Polymer Clay artists will tell you that any piece you make is covered in your fingerprints – which is fine, you can get rid of those afterwards – but I wanted to keep the clay as smooth as possible in order to get the flowing curves that I wanted the wings to have.
handmade by Cobwebs at The Cobweborium Emporium
The funny thing isthat the photograph looks like there are bumps and angles all over the place, – yet when you look at the wings with your naked eye there are no bumps or angles to be seen, they curve gently and gracefully both out at the bottom and they curve around at the top. There are no lumps and no holes, yet the flash on the camera has reflected the high shine of the silver wings in such a way that they don’t look smooth at all!
There are 4 metal golden feathers and one silver feather imbedded into the clay of these wings. I had to be careful about those feathers because they had to be curved in such a way that they matched the curve of the wings perfectly. I used some jewellery tools to make them bend, as jewellery tools are more ‘gentle’ and give you more control so you can use them to bend things without spoiling them.
Well, that’s me done and dusted for today. What have you been making lately?
A few years ago I bought pair of vintage earrings from a car boot sale….
Vintage Unicorn Earrings which inspired the Enchanted Unicorn Focal Pendant.
I can’t remember how much I paid for them but I have this feeling that it was something like £2.00 or £2.50. I wasn’t buying them to wear, I bought them because they’d charmed me and I’d fallen in love with them. I ‘needed’ to own them so that I could look at them – and for a while they sat on my dressing table where I could see them, and pick them up too, because they’re so amazingly tactile and they feel so lovely in the hand!
A few weeks after I’d bought them I looked at them and had an idea that maybe I could make something a little inspired by them, perhaps a pendant, either on a beaded necklace or hung on a coloured rope type necklace. So I took them to my work desk and, using them as inspiration, I made a unicorn using polymer clay.
The Enchanted Unicorn – A Gem set Focal Pendant. (handmade by Cobwebs at The Cobweborium Emporium)
All made from white polymer clay. The head, neck and ears were pretty easy to form, – a long(ish) sausage, thicker at one end and tapering off at the other– but I decided to make the neck a lot shorter than the necks of the unicorn earrings, and also the face a little plumper. I wanted to give my Unicorn a shorter nose too, as I wanted him/her to look a little more ‘comely’, sort of a bit more friendly and maybe a tad more magical.
Once the head and neck were formed it was at this point that I had to decide where to put the ‘hole’ for the necklace part. I knew I wanted a hidden hole, so had to work out where the hole would have to be in order for the pendant to hang properly and where I could hide the hole with ‘hair’. I’ll admit at this point that pushing a knitting needle through the head of this incredible magical beast felt SO cruel. Ugh, … I felt like the RSPCA would be knocking on the door any minute and I’d be arrested for cruelty towards a *mythical* creature.
Hole made, … Next came the Unicorn horn. I chose a long, (rectangle shape) freshwater Biwa pearl for this, which I wrapped with a short wire twist, added a little liquid clay to it so it would anchor firmly and then slowly and carefully pushed the horn into the Unicorns head.
Next … the eyes.
a part of a Unicorn, handmade by Cobwebs at The Cobweborium Emporium
I know when you look at the bigger photograph of the Unicorn, the eye kind of looks like it could be complicated. Don’t be fooled, it’s way easier than it looks.
The eye itself is a round, polished gemstone which is set into an eye socket (a sort of ‘crater’) which I made by pushing a sculptor’s ball tool into the clay to make that eye socket. If your a crafter you might well have a ball tool which you use to press into the centre of a punched out flower in order to give it that realistic look. Providing that you’ll never use that tool on any food item, then you can use the tool on polymer clay. But if you’re possibly going to use any item for food making then you MUSN’T use it on polymer clay.
After the socket was formed, I rolled a small, thin sausage of clay and wound it in a circle around the eye, cutting it at just the right point (I find an angle cut works better than a straight cut & it’s easier to ‘hide’ the join or seam) and then closed the seam between the two ends by carefully blending the ends of the clay together. I added a tiny bit of liquid clay into the socket and then took my bead and inserted a little ‘thread’ of wire through it, twisted it around the back and then gave it a little kink so that it would work as an anchor to hold the gem bead in the socket. I then carefully pushed the bead gem into the socket, making sure that the wire went through that tiny bit of liquid clay, so that the liquid would wrap itself around the clay and ‘set’ when the clay went into the oven.
Now it was time to add the mane.
As I made the curls of hair, I applied each one very carefully so that they built up in layers, hiding the hole I’d cruelly made through his/her head for the necklace . I also wanted to add a twist. I wanted it to be more magical than just a mane, so added real gemstone beads, tucking and nestling them into the curls of hair, anchoring each one with a twist of wire threaded through the small holes drilled in the gemstones.
Once I’d built up the mane I gave him/her flared nostrils and then finally I gave the face and neck some texture. I thought about brushing ‘hair’ into the tiny sculpture but dismissed that idea straight away. I knew that it wouldn’t look like the magical creature I saw in my minds eye, so instead I used one of my small ball tools and gently prodded little dips into his body which turned out to be the perfect texture and suited him/her down to the ground. (or to the end of his/her neck at any rate!)
The final thingI did was to add a little Pearl-Ex powders, in various places and various colours, so that the P.Ex picked up on the colours of the gem stones and gave a little ‘glow’ around them and accentuated the deep blue of the eye.
He then went into the oven and, a little while later,a unicorn was born.
The Enchanted Unicorn – A Gem set Focal Pendant. (handmade by Cobwebs at The Cobweborium Emporium)
An extra bit ….
If I were to make the unicorn again, I’d make the mane of thicker pieces of clay rather than those small curls. Although I love the individual smaller curls, I worry about them catching on something and being broken.
—-> * mythical*creature<—–~ … … ‘mythical’? – bah humbug! From where I’m sat typing this I can clearly see my Unicorn in my garden. He’s a fabulous chap and doesn’t mind me trimming his tail to make paint brushes. <innocent face>
The Art of Cobwebs 