Violet Necklace: #RainbowHop14

Happy St. Patrick’s Day, friends!  You may be expecting to see a green-themed post today, but I’ve actually got something very different for you…Violet!  You see, my friend Laura Kelly invited me to participate in a fun Blog Hop just for St. Patrick’s Day called “Create a Rainbow!”  Each of us was assigned a color {I got my favorite!} and Laura sent us some supplies to play with to create a project based on that color.

After looking at all my fun supplies, I decided to play with the Sculpey clay and create a fun statement necklace…take a look!

Materials:
– Sculpey polyform clay {I used purple and white}
– toothpick
– some type of rolling pin
– circle “cutter” the size you want your discs to be
– baking sheet and foil or parchment paper
– stringing wire
– crimp beads
– chain and jump rings {my chain and connectors are from the Styled by Tori Spelling collection}
– wire cutters, needle nose pliers

Step 1: Roll your clay to 1/4″ thickness.  It’s generally not a good idea to use the same tools you use with Sculpey when you’re making food, so you should have a separate rolling pin for this.  Don’t use the one you use to roll out your Christmas cookies, mmm-kay?  I didn’t happen to have a spare rolling pin, so I found the next best thing…we use such high-tech tools here in the Artsy family.

Step 2: Cut out your discs.  Again, we’re not going to use anything we use for food, so I had to get creative.  Can you guess what this is?  It was just the right size for my circles.  I cut out 15 dark purples.  Repeat for each color.  I cut several discs from white clay, then mixed white and purple clay together to create a lighter shade and cut out 5 of those.

Step 3: Spread discs on a foil lined baking sheet.  Poke a hole in the center of each one using a toothpick, then bake according to package directions.  Mine took 15 minutes at 275 F.

Step 4: String your discs.  You can keep this very simple and put them on a piece of cord, string, or leather.  I decided I wanted a chain look, so first I needed to place my discs on a piece of stringing wire and secure each end with a crimp bead and jump ring.

Then, I used a chain and connectors from the Styled by Tori Spelling collection to complete my necklace.  You could also add any regular type of chain instead.

 What do you think?  I am loving it, and I especially can’t wait to wear it during Ravens season!  Is this something you’d create?  Wear?  By the way, my inspiration came from a very cool Etsy shop called notTuesday.

Meanwhile, the Rainbow Hop fun is far from over!  First of all, we have a giveaway for you!  The prize is an amazing DIY Rainbow Colored Supply Stash!  Buttons, paint, clay…all kinds of goodies in all the colors of the rainbow await you so you can make some colorful projects of your own.  Rafflecopter will walk you through the entry process; good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway
And don’t forget to take a look at the other colorful projects created by artists and designers all over blogland!