Marbled Clay Bowls

This is a craft that I planned for my whole family (ages 2 - 62) and that everyone really enjoyed.  I read other blogs about making these and everyone said "they're addictive" and we found that to be true as well!  

Something else I love about these is that every one is unique and special.

1. For This Project You'll Need:
2. Polymer Clay - assortment of colors, larger size of white clay
3. Knife
4. Cutting board
5. Rolling Pin
6. Liquid Gilding
7. Small Paint Brush
8. Oven Safe Bowls
9. Baking Sheet
10. Oven

I gave everyone about 3/4 inch of white clay and then let them choose two other colors and gave them about a 1/4 inch of each of those colors.

Then we rolled each color separately into a "snake" about 5 inches long.  Then we twisted the snakes together several times.  Then fold that long piece in half and twist again.  Once you've done that, smush into a ball and then roll it into a flat disk shape, the thickness should be approx. 2-3 quarters stacked on top of each other.  

Then set the disk shape into your oven safe bowls and make it conform to the bowl shape, but the clay should not be pressed tightly to the bowl.  Then trim the top edge of the bowl, if you want.

Then bake, according to your directions on your clay.  Mine was 275 for 15 minutes.  

Once they started to cool, it was easier to get the bowls out and set on a cooling rack. 

The final step is to paint the liquid gilding around the top edge.  

How To Paint a Metal Bed Frame

For my guestroom, I searched Pinterest for inspiration and knew I wanted a bed frame that looked like this:

Or like this:

So I kept an eye on Facebook Marketplace and found a few options and found this listed for sale and decided this was it.

I didn't like the gold and there were a lot of areas where the paint had been chipped off, so I knew I would need to refinish it.  One of the reasons I'm doing this post is because I couldn't find that many online tutorials.

Step one was to obtain the bed.  (Which I did, thanks to the help of my parents!) Step two was to get all the materials.

I stood in the paint aisle in Menards FOREVER. In fact, here is my FB post from that day, explaining.

Here are the paints I was debating between.

I always love the look of satin, but I hadn't really painted metal before. For some reason I was worried it would look dull. So that's why I bought the metallic initially and then ended up with satin finish - which turned out to be perfect and exactly what I wanted.

From Menards, I bought:

medium sander
Krud Kutter deglosser
2 tarps
4 cans of the satin finish spray paint
paint handle (which is TOTALLY worth buying)

I should have bought a painting mask, because I could tell it affected my sinuses not wearing one.

Step three is to prep.  So, I carried each piece to my driveway and filled a bucket with water and dishsoap and got out my gloves and an old washrag and cleaned every piece, making sure to get dirt out of detail/crevice areas.

Then I tried both the deglosser and sanding on two different parts and I recommend sanding.  It's easier and I thought it prepped the pieces better.  And it saves you money to only buy one thing.

After sanding, you need to wipe everything down, I think I used a clean microfiber cloth.

Then I started spraying - following the instructions on the can.  A light coat 8-10 inches away.  Slow back and forth motion.  Ok to do the second a few minutes after the first.  I could tell immediately I made the right choice on the finish.

Then I dragged the tarps into the garage and let them cure for 24 hours.

I actually spread the painting out over two days.  The first day was perfect.  The second day had wind speeds of 25 mph - which was NOT GOOD.  First it blows the paint away from it's target, not coating evenly and making you use more paint.  Second, it blows junk onto your paint.  Make sure you check wind speeds before you start painting.

Then I carried each piece into my guestroom and put it together and it's SO EXCITING!  I haven't bought a mattress for it yet, it'll be a work in progress for a while, but it feels good to have this first step accomplished!