More stuff

OK, I lied about not being as excited about polymer clay. I bought this awesome pasta machine device.

And lo, it is awesome, and makes sheets and tiles of clay an easy thing. I made some dinosaur scale pendant thingies. Interference powder is neat! It makes things shiny! The first set had the interference powder brushed on before baking, and then I added a clear acrylic glaze. For the second set, I mixed interference powder and translucent liquid Sculpey and painted it on before baking. It seems to have turned out slightly less glossy.

So, sewing. I got out my Singer and played with a silk shirt from dollar-a-pound. I was kind of fixated on making gathers. This was annoying when the thread decided to break and stuff, and I got kind of frustrated with my early attempts. (Though the frustrated/screwed up fabric looks kind of cool in retrospect, and maybe will be used for something else later). Then I realized that silk + water = wrinkles.



I sewed a few lines of running stitches, gathered with them, ran the whole thing under water, and twisted it as much as possible and let it dry. Then I pulled out the gather stitches altogether, leaving tiny holes and lots of pretty wrinkles. I folded up the ends around some ribbon to make a pretty, modern-looking choker thingy (which doesn't look good on me, but would look amazing on someone with a long, graceful neck). I think I'm proud enough of it that I'll add it to my etsy shop later this weekend.