Gilded Valentine Embellishment

Christmas 2014 is now just a memory, and we're moving on to the next holiday—Valentine's Day.

We started with Creative Paperclay® and a clay mold. Molds are a great way for young ones to complete successful projects.

Next, we roughly rolled out three large clay logs.

We pressed the logs into the heart-shaped mold.

To get a flat back on our piece, we turned the mold and clay over onto our Teflon mat and pressed to flatten it.

The next step is always the hardest—waiting for the clay to dry. After it was dry, I trimmed the excess away and sanded the edges.

The last step was gilding the embellishment. First, we sealed the piece with an acrylic medium. When that was dry, we coated it with Duo Adhesive. When dry, the Duo is a tacky, sticky adhesive, perfect for applying gilding. 

This is our finished piece after the gilding was burnished and polished.

We're not sure how this Valentine embellishment will be used, but we have some ideas. Perhaps on the cover of a special journal or photo album. Embellishment on a greeting card. Part of a Valentine wall decoration. However it is used, Chloe and I are ready for Valentine's Day.

Carole	Chloe
Table Cell	Table Cell

Jess B's - Sacred Heart Shrine

Hello Everyone,

February is here and Love is in the air!

today I created 

a

SACRED HEART SHRINE

Creative Paperclay®  mixed with red acrylic paint

Painted cross black

 used candy mold to shape hearts

 

Used toothpicks, glue, and glitter

pierced holes along the heart to be able to insert the toothpicks

baked Creative Paperclay® according to directions

 

love the imperfections in the heart

added glittered toothpicks

decorated the cross

 added Tim Holtz idea-ology adornments

(added some turquoise acrylic paints to give the patina look

added some roses to complete

HISTORY

The Sacred Heart (also known as Most Sacred Heart of Jesus) is one of the most widely practiced and well known devotions, takingJesus' physical heart as the representation of his divine love for humanity.

This devotion is predominantly used in the Catholic Church and among some high-church Anglicans and Lutherans. The devotion especially emphasizes the unmitigated love, compassion, and long-suffering of the heart of Christ towards humanity. The origin of this devotion in its modern form is derived from a French Roman Catholic nun, Marguerite Marie Alacoque, who said she learned the devotion from Jesus during a mystical experience. Predecessors to the modern devotion arose unmistakably in the Middle Ages in various facets of Catholic mysticism.^[1]

In the Roman Catholic tradition, the Sacred Heart has been closely associated with Acts of Reparation to Jesus Christ. In hisencyclical Miserentissimus Redemptor, Pope Pius XI stated: "the spirit of expiation or reparation has always had the first and foremost place in the worship given to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus".^[2] The Golden Arrow Prayer directly refers to the Sacred Heart.

Devotion to the Sacred Heart is sometimes seen in the Eastern Catholic Churches, where it remains a point of controversy and is seen as an example of Liturgical Latinisation.

The Sacred Heart is often depicted in Christian art as a flaming heart shining with divine light, pierced by the lance-wound, encircled by the crown of thorns, surmounted by a cross and bleeding. Sometimes the image is shown shining within the bosom of Christ with his wounded hands pointing at the heart. The wounds and crown of thorns allude to the manner of Jesus' death, while the fire represents the transformative power of divine love.

The Feast of the Sacred Heart has been in the Roman Catholic liturgical calendar since 1856, and is celebrated 19 days afterPentecost. As Pentecost is always celebrated on Sunday, the Feast of the Sacred Heart always falls on a Friday.

Thanks for stopping by

Creative Paperclay® Heart pendant

With Valentines on its way my head is filled with hearts so this month I'm going to create an easy but very pretty Heart pendant using Creative Paperclay®.

Material list:
Creative Paperclay®
wire - for the bail
tool to stamp in your texture
acrylic paints

1. Make a paperclay ball, about the size of a walnut. Actually, the amount of clay you use really depends on the size you want your finished piece so play around. If you use too much simply make the ball smaller and reshate again.

2. Start shaping the clay into a heart. I first roll the ball in my hands to form a cone shape and then squish and moosh the clay into a heart shape. This is play time so have fun and don't worry if your heart isn't a perfectly shaped heart. I kinda like the wonky look, I think it gives the pendant more character.

3. Insert your wire bail into the top of your pendant. Since mine is a wonky heart I inserted the bail so the heart will hang at an angle.

4. Next we stamp in our texture. I used a leather stamping tool for my texture but you can use whatever you have handy. Stamp the texture deep enough to make it look like it's inside the heart, not on the surface of the heart.

5. Once you get the look you like let the pendant completely dry. What? We're done? Yep, how easy is this! :)

6. After it dries completely you can paint it . I started by painting the entire pendant black. I then dry-brushed metalic gold and red. That gives the pendant an aged look that I love. After the paint dried I sprayed a couple of layers of polyurathane on it to protect the paint. All that's left to do is sting it on a cord or ribbon and you have a beautiful heart to wear.

Creative Paperclay® Embellishments for Cards!

Use Creative Paperclay® to create light weight embellishments for your handmade greeting cards.

I love vintage Valentines and have a large collection  of them.  This time of year I love using them to make the Valentines to give to my special friends!  For this card I used a couple of with a sewing theme.  I wanted a little something extra on the card to give it some dimension, so I made a half spool of thread for the card.

Supplies:

Creative Paperclay®

Mold Compound

Spool

Brown ink

Embroidery floss

Valentines

GLitter Glue

Doily

Card stock for card base

Pattern paper for background

First, I made a mold using a spool.  Pictured is the mold with Creative Paperclay® drying in the mold.  I like to give my items at least a few hours to dry (sometimes 24 depending on the thickness of the object.)  Once the spool was dry I inked it.  Then wrapped it with embroidery thread (to look like a thread.)

Fussy cut the Valentines. Attach the pattern paper to the card base, then the doily, and Valentines.  Using Tacky glue attach the spool of thread.

 Add a little glitter glue to the dress and hair bow.

The Valentine is complete...

Watch for Blog Hop February 1st

Love Cast in Clay!