Birthstones: April -Diamond

A girl’s best friend!  Diamonds come in many colours, but it’s the clear ones that are normally associated with April.  The name comes from the Greek “adamas” meaning “unconquerable”.

Unfortunately the birthstone for this month tends to be a little on the expensive side!  So as alternatives, you could try some Fire Polished Glass beads, or Rhinestones, or perhaps go for the secondary birthstone of Rock Crystal Quartz.

The origins of diamonds were attributed to falling stars, the tears of the gods, or shards from lightning strikes in various legends from around the world.

In one story from Indian mythology, the god of storms and war, Indra was fighting host of demons led by Jalamdhara.  In the fighting the demon Bali fell and a stream of jewels fell from his mouth.  Indra was so amazed that he struck open the demon’s body with one of his thunderbolts.

The different parts of Bali’s body became the seeds of precious stones.  Diamonds were produced from his bones, sapphires from his eyes, rubies from his blood, emeralds from his marrow, crystal from his flesh, coral from his tongue, and pearls from his teeth.

Diamond was thought to make the wearer stronger, and a diamond worn into battle was said to make the wearer invincible.

Diamonds have represented the highest ideals in history; strength, innocence, purity and truth.

Tutorial - Flowers in the Church

Ah Spring, when the flowers are blooming!

This month's tutorial was inspired by the flowers in the church, from Final Fantasy VII.  They are big and daft and cartoony - but a bit of fun!

You will need:

White polymer clay
Yellow Polymer clay
Green Polymer clay
Green craft wire

Step 1:

Condition your clay for use, warming it up by kneeding.  Take some yellow and mix with white so you get a pale yellow.  Now you can have flowers in three colours!

Step2:

Start with your white clay.  Use a piece that is roughly a 2.5cm (1 inch) ball.

Break the clay into seven evenly sized pieces and roll them into balls.

Step 3:

Roll six of the balls into sausgae shapes - pointy at each end and thicker in the middle.

Step 4:

Now squash those sausages flat, and you should get petal shapes. :)

Step 5:

Cut some craft wire, and push it through the ball of clay.

You will need two pieces to go all the way through - your other pieces can just stick out one side.  This will be the centre of your flower.  Make sure to leave the two pieces long - longer than I have done in the picture.  These are the bits of wire you'll be using to attach the flower to things, so the longer the better!

Step 6:

Roll some green clay, and put them on the ends of your wire.  (Note:  Some of them may not want to stick.  No worries!  Just make them the right size and make a hole for the wire to go in - then once they are baked you can use certain types of glue with polymer clay to make it stick.  Two part epoxy resin is a very strong one that will work, for example.  If you are just making it for fun, you can even use normal super glue, although it may not work as well for prolonged useage, depending on the type!)

Variation:  Alternatively, you could just roll small loops into the ends of the wire so that they curl over.  If you do this, it would be better to do it before you stick the wire in the clay, as that will make it very fiddly!

Step 7:

Arrange your petals around the ball and smooth them on.

Step 8:

Repeat to make more flowers with your yellow clays.  I made two white, two pale yellow, and one dark yellow.  Once you are done, arrange them carefully on a baking tray and bake the clay according to the manufacture's instructions.

Step 9:

Once your flowers have cooled, you can varnish them, if you like. 

Now you can use the long wires to attach them to whatever you like! :)
I attached mine to a hairslide blank, and then wired some green beads around the bottom.