This summer, my bff, my daughter and I went to Galena, IL for a girls' weekend.  Galena is an old river town resurrected into a tourist location.  There's lots of cute shops in every category, great restaurants, some historical sites (US Grant's home), some B&Bs, etc.  We checked out everything!  One of the hot trends in gifts, home decor, fashion accessories, and more this year has been owls.

Like it or not, the holidays are upon us.  Whether you fall on the side of "no Christmas until after Thanksgiving" or you welcome it in July - it IS time for making those holiday gifts.  This is one of my favorite things I've ever created for Christmas.  I did this for Sculpey in 2005 according to my records.  These are just blocks of red Sculpey III (or Premo Pomegranite now would work also!) that are cut into rectangles and squares and "beribboned" with little strips of Premo! Sculpey Gold clay.

 I love when I find a new toy to use with my clay. This one that I'm facinated with right now isn't new, but I got a new outlook on it from my son.  Paint.  Yeah, I'm painting my clay and more than just slapping on a single color for antiquing.

Check out this bracelet I had made.  Kinda blah right?  I started to antique the silver on it and I got an idea..

My favorite words when a Sculpey RFP for a project comes are "can you make it different and/or edgy?"  Yeah Baby! That's right up my crafting alley.

Tip #1: When you're done using the Sculpey Clay Extruder, take the plunger out, unscrew the disk holder and remove the disk. Now bake all the pieces for 15 minutes; allow to cool and peel off the baked clay. So much easier than trying to clean raw clay out of the barrel!

One of my favorite things about polymer clay is its snafitry. That’s a word I just made up that means “easy to make something nice the first time you try.”

Anyhow, a knitting friend recently admired one of my polymer clay shawl pins, and asked if I she could commission me to make some for her. I said, “Better yet – why don’t you come over and I’ll show you how to make them yourself.” To my delight, she said yes.

Inspiration can come from so many places.  Some unexpected!

My boys and I were over at our neighbor's house taking care of their cats while they were away.  I happened

to notice this cute little painted wooden sign hanging on the wall.  It said "If friends were flowers I'd pick you".

I thought this was so cute.

I had been racking my brain recently trying to come up with a gift idea for the ladies I work with.  At the end

     Hello everyone!  It is great to be back on our design team blog.  I have so enjoyed reading what my fellow designers have been up to.  I have some fun things that I would like to share with you during this month of June.

     I just finished up another fun of year of being an assistant pre-school teacher.  Our classroom consisted of 14

3 to 5 years olds.   As the assistant teacher one of my main jobs is to do an art project with the children each day.

                I’ve been around the polymer clay world for over 20 years.  In the beginning of my experience as a clayer, our corner of the art world was filled with excitement.  It often felt like a race.  Designers were intent on exploring and mapping the possibilities of this wonderful medium.  We were interested in developing the next new technique, the next application of principles and materials from other media into our beloved polymer clay.  My first book in 2004, Polyme