I recently got an email from a crafty friend asking if I’ve picked up any crafty tips while working at Duncan headquarters.
YES! YES! YES!
Here are a couple of my favorites.
Cheryl Ball is a talented designer on board who handed me a crayon one time when I was fumbling with crystals while I was decking out one of my shrines. I looked at her like, “Huh?”
“Pick up the crystal with the crayon and place it on the glue,” she said. OMG. Changed my life forever!
These next two pictures are using Tulip Velveteen paint (dries to a velvet finish!), you run a heat gun over the paint and it turns to suede. Works great on large designs. VERY COOL effect. I outlined my nmae so that I could fill it in with glitter paint. The raised edges act as an embossed barrier.
This last one I picked up from a circus face painter a few years back and I recently shared it with my Duncan friends. This face painter used an empty squeeze bottle to blow glitter off the painted cheeks of her clients. For this, you need a large bottle with a small tip. I used an empty dye bottle and it works great for blowing away excess glitter! You just squeeze it real fast and no more pesky glitter leftovers!
Here are a few other tips I’ve learned through all my trial and errors over the years:
– If your glue gun gets clogged, hang it upside down inside a (cheap) ceramic coffee cup to drain it. This one is from Debbie at Duncan, it works!)
– When working with resin, set your pieces to cure on wax paper, it won’t stick.
– Rubber/silicone baking molds like this, make PERFECT resin molds! you can make keychains or pendants, coasters, etc.
– Want quick embellishments? Squirt some colored hot glue in polymer clay molds, let them cool and pop them out.
– Tired of filling bottlecaps with resin? Try checkers instead! They have a little dish look to them, so you can glue in a picture or whatever.
– Baby wipes are awesome to clean your hands when working on your crafts. Goo Gone or Lava soap works great for removing super sticky glue from your skin.
OK, that’s all I’m spilling! Do you have any?
Today was an amazing day at work. I love coming to Fresno. I still miss my family terribly, but the team at Duncan are my second family. Today, it seemed wherever I walked around the office, everyone seemed to be working on Crafty Chica goodies. The packaging will blow you away. I saw full-on finished boxes with the actual products inside. At first glance, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear it belonged at Sephora. It looks super stylized, like gourmet make-up!
Tomorrow I’m heading in early to make more completed models. Poor Patrick is at home painting our kitchen cabinets (he and the kids sanded them down today), and then he moves on to painting the interior of the house. This is for the camera crew that is coming over next week. He is busting his bootie, and I’m over here in Cali giggling and sprinkling glitter.
Aye, I feel guilty…
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Author of Crafty Chica’s Art de la Soul: Glittery Ideas to Liven Up Your Life ($19.95, Rayo Books, an imprint of Harper Collins).
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These are great! Love the crayon thing.
I often have to round off the end of a dowel when doing projects with children. To make it very fast and easy, I just shave pieces off the end using a handheld pencil sharpener. Then I twist the end against a piece of sandpaper in my palm and voila! A smooth, rounded tip.
My tip is to hit an organdy ribbon bow with a blast from the heat gun. It gives it a cool, crinkly look.
I guess there’s a tool to pick those crystals, I mean, I’m portuguese and I read some brazilian magazines, they talk about a “palito pega strass” =\
If I get to know what it is, I’ll post it in my blog =)
Kiss
Well, I’ve been googling and… =S It’s nothing more than a stick with some bee wax in one of the sides! I guess I’ll try the crayon thing =P
Thanks for the idea =) kiss