DIY Miniature Button Cake Stands

Miniature Button Cake Stands

A few months ago I went to a yarn store with my mother. While she spent an eternity comparing seemingly identical balls of wool, I browsed the buttons. I found these two which I though could possibly be turned into mini cake stands.

Flat topped buttons for making cake stands

So I finally made them. I made the bases out of white and black polymer clay. After baking the clay I super glued on the buttons. It all took about 30 minutes.

button cake stands

Geekery (Polymer Clay Super Mario Magnets)

Super Mario Magnets with Polymer Clay

These magnets are about an inch in diameter. They are pretty easy to make and only take a few colors.  The star and cloud look dirty and wonky if you seem them up close. You would think that a cloud and star would be the easiest to replicate. A star is surprisingly hard to make symmetric. And white clay is impossible to keep clean. Every fabric fiber in my apartment is drawn into the white clay by some annoying unexplainable force.  Lets see, you need:

• Polymer Clay: green, red, white, black, yellow, brown, beige

• Magnets: I buy ugly magnets from the dollar store them SMASH them with my meat hammer/tenderizer to get the magnets out. (note: do not attempt while hung over or you may smash your finger due to impaired reflexes... o_O).

• Glaze: I like the toxic Sculpy glaze for these. It is super thick and smells like murdering brain cells.

** also as a side note, why is centering these pictures so hard. I am giving up.. urg!

super mario polymer clay magnets.

Maybe I have one too many fridge magnets. ...

Miniature Baguette Keychain

Yesterday I made a miniature baguette. This must be the most useless hobby. Here I am, a poor hungry grad student, and I am making fake miniature food. Anyway, I think the bread is looking good. Of course it could always be better.

To make these useless things you will need:

• white, translucent and beige polymer clay.** EDIT (no beige..just white and trans..looks much better)
• oil free pastels (yellows, browns ***EDIT and white for flour dusting)
• knife, toothpick and paintbrush

Clay is usually about $3/packet (here in Canada), and at an art store you can pick up pastels for about $1 a piece. I had a hard time finding good oil free pastels. With these supplies you could easily make 30-50 baguettes...

 STEP 1: First mix the clay together on the math bio text book you only reference on occasion. I use about 1:1:1 ratios. That is a lie, I just use whatever.

 STEP 2: Shape the clay into baguettes. Make little triangles with the toothpick. 

 STEP 3: mix some pastel together to make a bread color. You need yellow or it will not come out looking nice.

 Take a paintbrush and brush the pastel (its more like colored chalk) onto the clay. Leave the triangles color free.

 STEP 4: bake for about 30min. If you want to make a key chain insert a ring before baking.