This tip is courtesy of Jana Ewy who took the time to write the Friendly Plastic Encyclopedia which is available on the side bar of the blog. We continue to grow in readers who are new to Friendly Plastic so these basic techniques are good reminders to all of us, whether we are seasoned FP'rs or just in the beginning stages. What do you need to know when purchasing Friendly Plastic? And, after you purchase what's the best way to store it? What if you've purchased a dreaded SNAPPER???? Read on for Jana's tips:
Friendly Plastic® has a shelf life if not properly stored. Exactly what that shelf life is, is unknown, with so many determining factors to be considered. The main points of this section is to help you purchase fresh Friendly Plastic®, suggest a few storing options, and share a little trick for reconditioning old Friendly Plastic®.
WARNING: With the renewed interest in Friendly Plastic®, a lot of old product is re-surfacing like buried treasure and being put up for auction. Buyers Beware!
Purchasing – When purchasing Friendly Plastic®, you want to make sure the plastic is fresh. You do this by giving it the flex-test, simply give the stick a little bend, it should flex quite easily and then straighten back out. If it snaps in half, you guessed it… it’s a SNAPPER (old plastic). This is where ordering on-line can be a problem. My suggestion is to make sure you are ordering from a reputable dealer. Try to resist de-stash bargains and auctions. You want a guarantee that the plastic is fresh, be sure the dealer offers this.
Storing – Keep your plastic in a closed container or zip-lock bag, when not in use. This seems to be the trick to longevity.
Reconditioning – If you have SNAPPERS (old plastic), all is not lost. Old Friendly Plastic® can be reconditioned. Here is how: Place the sticks on a nonstick pan and either place the pan onto a griddle or into an oven, temperature set at 200°F (a heat tool will not work). Allow the plastic sticks to soften completely. Remove the pan from the heat and allow the sticks to cool completely on their own. DO NOT run them under cold water. Once they have cooled, remove them from the pan and check the flexibility. Hopefully this has done the trick. It is not fool proof, but it does work most of the time.
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
Shari Wallace of Wolf Creek Designs credits her inspiration to Jana Ewy's ID bracelets. Read on as she shares some of her latest work.
This is a Friendly Plastic cuff, made using alcohol inks and antique brass pieces. I adore the art deco feel of this piece, the dragonfly is amazing! This is one of my favorite cuffs so far. I'm gonna hate to part with it but someone needs to give this one a home and love it as much as I do.
Been trying some different finishing techniques with the cuff. I love Jana Ewy's hint on using the resin while the piece is still flat (see her article in the latest Belle Armoire Jewelry issue) - it works great with the ID bracelet pieces. I keep getting the resin too thick on the cuffs (because I love the look of the thick resin) but it makes it hard to get a good smooth bend. And the thicker the resin, the stiffer the bracelet ends up and its hard to get on and off. I need to find a happy medium in there! Next batch I will try the flat resin technique again but not make the resin quite so thick!
Want to see my ID bracelets too? Here's a sneak peek at one..
Jana, thanks so much for the idea on these! I love them and everyone that I've showed them to loves them too! I 'assembly line' the work so it seems to take forever to make them, but once the process is done I have more than a dozen ready to go at once.
I promise I will be back here more often...now that I am excited about jewelry again. I have a few more pieces to upload to Artfire and then I'm be putting some up on Etsy as well, but I haven't finished creating my store there yet - but soon!
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
Stitches is the British version of the CHA Show held each year in Birminham England. Although it's not the size of CHA, it doesnt lack for talent, demo's or creative inspiration. Personally, I think this show is much easier to manage and alot more up close and personal. I thought you might enjoy these show highlights from Jozart - one of the attendee's:
The highlight for me was the superb demonstration by Liz Welch who is so expert at Friendly Plastic techniques and I am thrilled that I will be taking a full workshop with her later in the year. She spent so much time giving us ideas, hints and tips and made Caz and I beautiful pieces to keep.
I also enjoyed Fran Seiford's workshop Painting with Powder which I know I will try again.
Down to earth now after a really colourful magic day.
Liz Welch, some of her samples made today and the lovely brooch she generously gave to me.
Fran Seiford from USA demming her Painting with Powder Technique
Caz with the shoe cards we made on the Woodware stand. My effort at the front. Tim Holtz made me a Grunge Paper Rose for my beret
Claudine demonstrated her sticky back canvas techniques
Suze Weinberg's UTEE dem
The bargain hotel, not bad eh? The Chase Coventry, about 15 mins from the NEC
Be sure and visit JOZART's blog for more creative inspiration. Thanks for sharing!
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
Thank you Di for sharing your tutorial on making this pendant! This is a great project to start with if you are new to Friendly Plastic. Simple yet elegant! Di shares:
I'm trying something new today and posting a tutorial. I don't know that this is my forte, but I indicated in a November post I would share the process I used to make the purple Friendly Plastic pendant, and today's the day. Today we're making a blue FP pendant.
Start with a bargain piece of costume jewelry. I'm using a silver clip earring. Cut a piece of FP slightly bigger than the earring and choose a stamp (I'm using one from Fancy Pants). Unmounted stamps work best if your piece isn't totally flat. You can use a stamp that's smaller than your piece, but I'm not good at placing them in the center so I just use oversize stamps to eliminate that problem.
Lay the FP over the piece & melt it with a heat gun.
When it's nicely melted, prepare your stamp by pressing it into a watermark stamp pad (I use VersaMark) and then pressing it into the FP. Use your fingers to press everywhere to ensure full contact. Experiment with the pressure for different looks. Firm pressure will reveal the metal underneath, which may or may not be your intent. That's what I did for the purple piece, but for this blue piece I chose to use less pressure.
When you're confident the stamp isn't going to lift from the FP, place the piece in a cold water bath to solidify the FP.
After a few moments remove the piece and carefully lift the stamp from the FP. The edges might be a little jagged, as you can see here.
Place a nonstick craft sheet (I use Ranger's) on a griddle and heat the griddle to 275. Lightly touch/drag the edges to melt/smooth them. Once cool, add your preferred glaze/sealer (I like Triple Thick by DecoArt) and a bail. Thread on a cord or chain and you're set!
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
Is your head spinning with ideas for the Rings and Things contest? What/!?!?!?! You don't know if you should enter???? WHY NOT!?!?! What have you got to lose? Check out this email below from one of the past winners:
Hi Linda, I visit the Friendly Plastic blog each day. I enjoy seeing new techniques and other artists work. On todays blog I noticed you mentioned the Rings and Things contest. I entered this contest in 2008 and won Polly's pick, Alternative Materials category. A picture of my friendly plastic pin "Shopper Girl" is featured on the friendly plastic page 361 in the 2009 catalog. I have attached a copy of my pin in case you don't have their catalog. Sincerely, Sherry McGilvray
Sherry was also one of the 2010 Design Challenge Winners! But....as she knows....you can't win if you don't enter! So get those entries in...then email me and let me know too!
Congratulations to Sherry! Next time...will I be congratulating you??
This picture seems quite fitting today as it's snowing outside my studio window located in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri. We are deep into winter and experiencing one of the harshest winters we've had in the past several years.
These snowflakes are the artwork of textile and Friendly Plastic artist Liz Welch, who resides in the UK. She is credited with developing the "Oooze" technique of which these snowflake ornaments were made. This is a great way to capture a snowflake forever!
To see more of Liz's work or to attend one of her workshops visit her blog: www.rarebird.wordpress.com
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
I had the privelege to see this butterfly in person at the recent CHA trade show in Anaheim California. It was LOVELY and the picture just doesnt do it justice! Adrienne shares her story below:
I made a friendly plastic butterfly for the AMACO butterfly competition - all the entries will go to the holocaust museum, each to represent a child who died. I had decided not to enter the competition, as I was very busy at the time, plus international postage is expensive. But somebody from AMACO emailed me and asked if I would submit an entry, which was flattering...
I made this in a bit of a hurry, and it's not as good as I would have liked, but I didn't have time to re-do it, so off it went! It was on display on the Amaco stand at CHA 2010!
The butterfly is about 4 inches across, and I used a colouring technique I learnt from Liz Welch - doodled alcohol ink. I didn't have time to take step by step pics when I was making the butterfly, but have included some from an earlier project (below) so that you can see how easy it is to do. To make the butterfly, I used 2 wing shapes cut from doodled sticks and a body made from a piece cut from a fuschia stick. I joined them all together by dipping the edges into hot water for a few moments then pressing them together and holding in position for a few moments. The antennae were made from copper wire.
To make doodled alcohol ink Friendly Plastic, take a stick of gold Friendly Plastic and drip some alcohol ink on it. The newer bright colours are good for this technique. You can blow the ink around using a straw if you like.Keep adding aclohol ink. If you're blowing it with a straw, you will find that the ink you're blowing comes to a sudden stop when it touches dry ink. So, eventually you will have to drip or dab the ink into the gaps.This is what the finished piece looks like, along with the inks I used.Now take a white Sakura souffle pen, and draw around the blobs using wriggly lines, then infill with doodles, until the piece is doodled all over. Easy to do, and looks very effective. Liz uses it to make beautiful pendants, by cutting it to shape and size and laying it into bezels, then covering with layers of resin and trapping doodles or tiny embellishments between the layers.
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
I hope you enjoy the latest in the Friendly Plastic TV series. This technique was one of many we demonstrated at the recent CHA Winter Show in Anaheim, California.
For more information on how to color pellets - see our video on youtube.
Congratulations to everyone who won one of the coveted etched glass awards!
Once again, CHA is behind us! BUT, for me at least, I left the show feeling very inspired! Here are a few highlights and some friends that visited the AMACO booth:
Terie Pauley - a brand spankin new artist to Friendly Plastic! And...get this...she WON BEST OF SHOW!!! and it was the first time entered the challenge....Terie even incorporated the hang tag with the Friendly Plastic logo into her design. Congratulations! We all look forward to seeing more of your work Terie.
Mylene Hillam an Austrialian Artist stopped by to say HI! She was invited to demonstrate her resin techniques in the Envirotex booth!
Jen Lowe demonstrates molding Friendly Plastic Pellets Jana working with Fracture and Fusion....
Over all it was a very very good show for us designers as well as AMACO. I am excited to see Friendly Plastic spill over to the educational side of things and become available to schools for their art department. It's great to be a part of this educational process!
Now....YOU CAN HELP! We know that you want to see this product more readily available, so PLEASE! Send me your testimonials and locations - just a quick email. I will be keeping track of the interest and this will be instumental in the overall availablity of Friendly Plastic in the future. CLICK HERE ! to tell me your story!
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
Well.....I didnt do so good on the picture taking today....I really was too busy! The day just flew by.
Jen WOWed everyone with colourizing pellets - (sorry no pic...bad me!) showing how to use alcohol inks, die cut and emboss with pellets..a real hit!
Jana continued her fracture and fusion series - always popular!
And I continued the pellet series with colourizing and using molds - again...no pic!! I need more arms!
Before the show though I was able to sneak over to the ETI booth - makers of Envirotex, the clear resin that we use to make Friendly Plastic look like glass - and snap a couple of pictures they had using Friendly Plastic and Envirotex! Great Job Designers!
These ink pens were designed by Mylene Hillam - well known to the blog...great job Mylene!
Tomorrow we will have the reception which I am priveleged to emcee and the winners will be announced! Congratulations to all our participants!!!
Linda Peterson is compensated and endorsed by AMACO. The guests features may or may not have any affiliation with AMACO.
