Online Course to Make

Faux Jade Prayer Box Necklace

and Silver Medallion Necklace

Supplies

How to Make the Faux Jade Clay

You will need 1/2 ounce of translucent clay and one small pea of medium green clay. (If you are using Sculpey III, one 2 oz. block of clay is divided into four panels. 1/2 ounce is one panel. To that one panel, you will be mixing one green pea-sized piece of clay. Mix that clay until it is a jade color. Make sure all of the marbeling is gone. Now you have your faux jade clay.

How to make the Prayer Box

Making the Beginning Canister:

Roll up a small piece of card stock into a long cylinder, the diameter of which is about 1/2 inch. Tape it securely. Using yoru rolling pin or pasta machine (neither of which should be used with food again), roll out a long rectangle of jade clay approximately 2.25 inches tall. Roll out a length long enough to cover the card stock roll. Cut the clay to fit and smooth the seam together to appear seamless.

Cut out a small circle of clay to fit the bottom of your clay roll to act as the "bottom" of the box. Attach these two together and using your sculpting tool, smooth together. Poke either one or two holes into the bottom, depending upon whether you want it to hang on one rope or if you will be wiring it shut. This project will show how to wire the box shut, so your prayer is secret only to you and God!

Place on your ceramic tile or foil disposable pan and bake according to the manufacturer's instructions. Allow to cool.

Making the Face:

Using your Jesus Face push mold, insert and fill the mold only half way full. Roll up another ball of clay and push against the back of the clay inside the mold. This second ball of clay will act as a handle and allow you to pull the face out without marring it. If you have any trouble getting it out, make sure you dust the inside with translucent face powder or talcum powder before inserting the clay.

Take the face and attach it to the prayer canister. Roll out a large rectangle of clay, approximately 1/16th of an inch thick.

Begin cutting off tiny slivers, in different shapes. After you have several slivers of clay, begin placing them "on end" next to the face. Their unevenness will create a "bark" look to it and where the face's hair begins and ends should be indistinguishable.

Cover the entire canister with the slivers of clay until it is completely full. At this point, you will know the exact size of your canister, so you can cut out a circle of clay to fit as a top, along with a smaller inner circle to allow the prayer box to completely shut. Poke two small holes into the top of the prayer box so you can wire it shut in the next step.

Again, bake according to the manufacturer's directions. When dry, coat with either an acrylic spray finish or with Future floor wax. Allow to fully dry.

Antiquing the Prayer Box:

Once your Prayer box is finished, coat the box with black antiquing paint or plain black acrylic paint. Once you brush the paint on, take a paper towel and wipe off. Wipe off all but the black that is caught in the deepest crevices. Allow to dry.

Making the Beads and the Tassel:

Using only black polymer clay, roll up two small beads about 1/2 inch in diameter and poke a hole through each one. These beads will be on the necklace part of the project as shown above.

Using your clay gun and the plate with the medium hole in it (one spaghetti string), extrude a long, long coil of black clay. Cut one piece about 1.25 inches long to be your tassel length. Then cut about 8 more pieces of black clay string the same length, putting them next to and on top of each other. This will create the bottom part of the tassel. Cut about 3 or 4 black clay strings about 1/2 inch long, lay them next to each other and fold them over in half. This creates the top section of the tassel bead. Then take a small piece of jade clay and roll it into a small narrow coil and use to attach the top and bottom of the tassel together.

The tassel bead is completed but cutting a 1.5 inch piece of 20 gauge wire and using your needle nose plyers, form a loop at the top of the wire. Insert the wire into the top of the tassel and make sure it is secured and hidden in the body of the tassel. You will be curing/baking this together.

There is one other knot bead that is made by cutting about 4 strings about 1.5 inches long and tying them over each other until it looks like a knot. Poke a hole through this and you have your knot bead.

Making the Necklace from the Screening Spline:

The screening spline is sold in Home Depot stores or Lowes. It is the spline used to fix screen windows and doors. It is black, rubber and has a tiny, tiny hole running in the middle of it. It is easy to insert wire loops into the ends of the spline, making a quick and fast necklace.

In order to make the necklace part, starting about 4 inches below your clavical bone, measure up and around your neck to the same point on the other side to get the length of necklace backing you will need. Cut this length out of the screening spline. Cut two 1.5 inch pieces of wire. Fold each piece of wire in half. Glue and insert the ends of the wire into the ends of the screening spline. Glue your filigree ends around your plain black beads and allow to fully dry.

Stringing it all together:

First, write out your prayer on a piece of paper and put aside. Take a long piece of 20 gauge wire and fold in half. Holding the prayer box upside down, and following the diagram above, insert the two ends of the wire into the little holes in the bottom of the prayer box. Turn the prayer box right side up, insert your special private prayer, run the wires through the top two holes in the cover, and twist the wires, locking your prayer inside. Follow the diagram as to how to connect all of the beads and the wire loops to complete the attachment.

Faux Silver Necklace

Supplies

Roll out a thin, 1/16th thick oval of silver clay. Using your Jesus Face mold, insert silver clay into the mold and fill only half way. Roll up another ball of clay, and push against the clay in the mold. This second ball of clay acts as a handle and will help you remove the Jesus Face. Once the face comes out, attach to the center of the oval of clay. Using the back of your xacto knife, indent the ray lines. Make the lines in the beard and hair deeper again using the back of your exacto knife. Using your permanent thin-lined marker, draw in the lines. Indent the eye irises a little bit to give it a more sculptural look. Using your clay gun and the thin spaghetti disc, extrude a long, long black shoe string of black clay for use in the next stage.

Roll out a black oval of clay, also 1/16th of an inch thick. Cut off a long piece of 20 gauge wire the length of the circle, plus two inches. Using your needle nose pliers, make a loop for the top of the necklace and also a loop for the bottom. Lay it across the back of the necklace. Fit the top of the necklace over the black back, sandwiching the wire between the layers. Run the spaghetti cord around the side of the necklace. You might need two rows of cord. Put together to attach firmly.

Roll one black flat bead, one red round bead, and one flat silver bead as illustrated to the left. Following the directions in the project above, make another tassel bead and bake according to the manufacturer's directions. Once the medallion is firmly together, and your beads are all formed, according to the manufacturer's directions. Cut off a 2 inch piece of 20 gauge wire. Wrap around a pen or pencil two or three times. Cut a 24 inch piece of screening spline. Cut two one-inch pieces of wire. Bend the wire pieces in half and loop through the ends of a necklace clasp. Insert and glue the ends of the wire into the ends of the spline. Allow to dry. Cut two inches of wire and make a loop at the top. Insert the three beads onto the wire, cut off the wire 1/2 inch below the last bead. Using your needle nose pliers, make another loop. Following the illustration to the left, attach all of the elements to complete the necklace. You're done! I hope you enjoyed it. Be sure to check back to my website at www.pushmolds.com to check for new projects and molds.