Liz gives making her own Clay Beads a go, read below to see how to make your own.
DIY Clay Beads
Have you ever seen those beautiful pastel coloured spheric beads? I always use to look at them and think, how are they made? Well it turns out you can make them with Clay!!
What you need:
- A handful of air dry clay – you can generally find this at spotlight and majority of art stores like Riot and Eckersley’s will have it also 🙂
- A straw (this is to make the whole in the centre of the bead)
- Acrylic paint and paint brush – you can buy this from the same places as where you got your clay from, and also most $2 shops should stock this.
- Some thick cord or string for your necklace.
Step One:
Roll 5 small round balls the size of a cherry aprox 2.5cm diameter. I did a few small ones too just to play around.
Step Two:
Get your straw and gently push it through the centre of your beads until it comes out the other side. Careful not to warp your bead in the process.
Step Three:
Place the beads on a sheet of baking paper or something non absorbent and leave to dry overnight. you will know they are ready when they turn a white colour. like this
Step Four:
Painting!! Yay the fun part, if you are after the simple pastel colours just mix your paints to get the colours you desire. If you are wanting some more details, you could wait until your base colour is dry and then add lines or dots, or symbols 🙂 let paint dry for a few hours. or use a hair dryer if you are impatient like me! as you can see i used the end of a paint brush to hold the bead while i painted it! made it so much easier and made sure i didn’t get any finger prints on there.
Step Five:
When paint is dry, simply thread your beads onto your cord or string and tie at the back, keeping it long enough for you to place over your head. or do a slip knot so you can adjust it 🙂
I also made another style as well just to change it up 🙂
heres how they turned out
** go crazy with your own shapes, you could even make geometrical shapes or smaller beads for bracelets etc.
HAVE FUN MAKING!!
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