To the bride-to-be..!

So I attended a hen (bachelorette) party of my colleague the other day, and I was appointed (proudly, heh) to be in charge of the gift for our hen. So I took some sleepless nights to produce this on short notice. The end product became one of my proudest and prettiest creation throughout my crafting journey, but unfortunately (and of course!) I couldn't keep it as mine :P Nonetheless, the feeling of pride and ultimate joy while presenting this beautiful gift to the hand of the rightful was simply too amazing to describe! :)

In the making... Strip by strip, the bun was finally formed!
And a little pink rose as the final decoration.

And that... is the end product! Sorry, I forgot to take the picture
once the doll had been made up... But just imagine having eye
brows and lashes, with reflections in the eyes, can you?

Ta Da.... The prettiest and the gorgeous! I'm in love with it!!!
(Figurine height: About 10 cm)

So there goes my gift for my dear bride-to-be. Oh if you wonder where would be the man, since you somehow noticed a man's head in the background of the first picture... I am sorry but I couldn't make it on time. So that, will be another story next time. Till then, I love you guys! Thanks for dropping by!

Work surfaces

I had been using a piece of tile to work my projects on, which served me quite well as it can be put into an oven together with the object without the need to transfer and thus risking to distort my figures. But ever since I moved, I left my old tiles at the old place and came here to find my scrap tiles are all of irregular surfaces. ):

So I had been working on a sheet of plastic wrapper pasted on my table all these while, like this;

While the plastic tears easily especially when cutting/slicing, the plastic sheet also tend to move/fold around when I rolled my clay pieces. So I went to Art Friend @ The Curve to look for surfaces to work on. Few choices I found to be rather useful - glass (RM 4.2 for a 15 x 15 cm piece), acrylic sheets, and finally polypropylene sheets. The glass is useful to directly build the pieces right on top and then send them all into the oven, but I did not purchase it as I have a specific aluminium baking tray for baking clay projects. 

Rummage... rummage... rummage... I finally found my work surfaces!

(To know which type of plastic material that can be used in contact with polymer clay, please refer to Garie's research with super detailed descriptions and photos.)

From the left: Acrylic sheet 2 mm, clear PP sheet .2 mm, and patterned PP sheet .3mm; all A3-sized.

The most useful work surface is the acrylic sheet (a.k.a. plexiglass) which was priced at RM 9.9 from Art Friend. It is rigid and clear, and I can easily slip a piece of paper with important measurements underneath to facilitate cutting/length estimation. Polypropylene (PP) sheets are much cheaper (RM 2 or less) to work on, however with only .2 mm thickness and the light-weighted property, fixation onto a table may be needed. Be careful if you are cutting the clay pieces here, as they can be cut through with a blade. While glass is more superior in this matter, the size offered was too small to make it worthwhile.

Update: Try checking out Ikea's glass shelf - Hemnes 44 x 30 cm for RM 10! Sounds like a better deal for this "off-label" use lol. 

Meanwhile... A curious cat decided to take a bite on the sharp edges.

So there you go, my updates on work surfaces. I still think tile is one of the best surfaces to have, but I also love the convenience of measuring my clay projects under the transparency of the acrylic sheet. I guess an A3-sized tempered glass surface would be my best bet to get the combined features huh? :P Which surface do you like to work polymer clay on? Let us know in the comment box below. Till then, have a blessed weekend and happy crafting. (:

Updates on Projects and Purchases

Good morning! Was busy but I managed to have some fun stuffs done in between my schedule. Let's get started.

Mini chocolate shaver, RM 2.5 from local baking supply shop

Found this cute chocolate shaver in a local supply store while buying some baking trays and the first thought coming to my mind was "this is definitely designed for miniatures" xD Well, it definitely can be used to shave some chocolate toppings on cakes, and in this case, the polymer clay miniature cakes.

Mini glass bottles and fitted corks, RM 8.8 for 10, off eBay.

Time for charm in a bottle! Been looking at ideas on bottled charms for some time and thought I could starting creating some really small charms in small bottles like this. Purchased these 24 x 11 mm glass bottles from China seller at a cheap price off eBay Malaysia and will be showing you the first (trial) bottled charm below.

Ta-Da! The first (but ugly) trial in making a bottled charm.

There you go! My first bottled charm made with a coconut tree on a small lonely island. The bottle was filled with glycerine and then sealed with glue. The glycerine distorted the coconut tree a little to look stumpier and shorter. I too have a problem making the sea look "right"; where I used translucent clay with a tinge of blue clay, but it did not look translucent at all... To be honest I had some difficulty sourcing resin... They are not cheap when it comes to EasyCast or similar things here (talking about something more than RM 50.0) in the local art supply stores. And beading.my has stopped selling epoxy resin ever since they fully converted their business to online store. If you guys have any idea where to buy epoxy resin at an affordable price, let me know!

Second master piece - bird in a bottle, diameter about 1 cm.
Reference here

A small teaser:

To be revealed. . . . . 

This would be a big one! :P I still need to make up some more detail and to add one more character into it to call it done. So stay tuned!

Ready to bake, but... Oops!

I made a miniature 1:12 baking equipments on top of a faux wooden tray (all by clay) the other day. And then I left it in a polypropylene container to be kept until I finally get access to my baking oven... But what came to my surprise was that my poor little tray was destroyed by the monster at home! Yes, M for monster! I guess she got a bit bored of herself when we left her at home for a night out and she decided to throw her tantrum. Saddened but anyhow this piece is destroyed, covered in all her lovely fur... ): 

Thank goodness I managed to have a pre-baked picture of this poor thing before it was ruined...

Now only a memory. . .

One a side note, I am on holiday! Just came back from Langkawi with loads of chocolate :P But my one-week holiday is finishing in few days time and I still have some errands to run... Better get creative! 

Mini-food update... one and the only.

Hello! It's been too long..! 

Polymer clay has been... well, very far from me for a long long time... ): 

Daily stress and strenuous workload is killing me, gosh! I need some relaxed time so I can spend some good quality time focusing on these small little miniatures again...

Anyway, this would be one new little update from my crafting collection, inspired after craving for a good meal of steak. Hah!

Steak with fries and salad. Yum?

Oh, this also marks the 100th picture posted in this blog (if I ain't wrong). Yay!

Happy crafting everybody, and I will be back!!!

Cake series, first update!

Presenting my first cake series!

Four cakes lined up for a great shot :P

Well, the following cake had definitely taken up some hours from my life! With liquid clay, I sliced the raw cane one by one and put it on semi-cured frosting. I do hope it looks realistic and nice.

Strawberry cake. Yum.

And the next one was pretty easy, only that I had to have lemon slices in hand... And the frostings were not that bad using a small icing tip.

Lemon cheese cake.

 Well, this is easier, except the sprinkles. Sprinkles can be pre-made by slicing thin, cured polymer clay rolls of different colours.

Confetti cake.

 And last but not least, this. Note that the chocolate crumbs can also be pre-made by scraping cured brown clay blocks, and you just have to apply a thin layer of liquid clay to make them stick.

Black forest cake.

I was having more cakes to make in my mind, but I was badly engaged in my daily affairs. Will update again when I have time, after I settle down, hopefully.

Where to buy polymer clay in Malaysia?

(Updated: October 11, 2016)

After so many attempts to look for polymer clay in Malaysia, more specifically in KL, I almost gave up. Through many forums (old and newly posted ones), Q&A pages and everything, finally I found a few (literally a few) of them who can help you if you're equally lost as well.

1. Multifilla Art & Craft Supplies (Seri Kembangan; NEW branch: 10 Boulevard, PJ)

This is one of the shops that sell complete range of crafting products. Their websites say them all and it is run by an old lovely couple. They are very helpful and will guide you through if you're a beginner. They have the famous brands of polymer clay, including FIMO (soft, classic, effect), Premo, Sculpey, and some Kato Polyclay to begin with. They also sell all kinds of tools.

I bought some FIMO soft and FIMO classic along with eye pins from them. FIMO is a standardised brand so expect the clay to be of similar and standard quality compared to other clays. Kato is really hard for me; it took me a long time to just condition the clay.

Bear in mind standard branded clays are not cheap so if you're budget tight I suggest you to read on.

2. STAEDTLER Malaysia online shop @ Rakuten

This site has closed down along with the termination of Rakuten services in Malaysia.

3. Artfriend (The Gardens, the Curve)

A Singapore-based chain store selling a wide range of crafting supplies, from pencils, water colours, various paints, beads and chains, to miniature building materials. You can easily find any (almost, any) kind of clay-related products you're looking for in this shop, be it polymer clay (air dry clay, paper clay, etc.), glaze, clay tools, pasta machine (for clay), and more! It's really a fun place where I could spend hours in it, looking at each items, drooling, but not buying them... Yes, it could be expensive! (e.g. Silicone mold maker at price of more than a hundred bucks..!)

One note, the outlet in the Curve is much bigger, and spacious.  

4. Craft Haven (One Utama)

This is another physical shop that sells polymer clay and other art materials in a shopping mall. Will not comment much as I have not been to that place just yet, and will do if I have some time in the future.  

5.Claystation Yong

They sell all sorts of polymer clay at price about half of those branded clays. Her workshop is located along the main road in Setapak so it's not difficult to find. They also offer various tools and other crafting materials (especially felts).

They have recently put up an e-shop but I am no longer sure if the workshop is still open for walk-ins, though.

6. Malaysia Clay Art

An online shop that sells polymer clay, air dry clay, and related accessories/tools. Looks promising! Perfect if you prefer to get items delivered to your doorstep. At occassions you get some free tutorials via e-mails. They also organize some competitions occasionally with prizes in the form of polymer clay for what you have created! :)

7. Beading.my

This is an online shop, mainly focusing on selling tools and miscellaneous for beads and/or jewellery making. Type "polymer clay" in the search bar and you will find FIMO and Monsterkraft. What's best is that they provide shipping nationwide and internationally. 

Please bear in mind that there are more shops to be discovered especially the art workshops or studios! Forgive me if I have not include them here, and do drop me a comment below so as to benefit everyone else (: I hope the summary above saves some of your time. Feel free to shower in more ideas!