This month’s We’re All Ears Challenge at Earrings Everyday is all about Autumn. And of course, that means leaf shaped charms! 🙂 I used polymer clay, alcohol inks and Perfect Pearls for mine.
The charms
On a yellow-tinged white sheet of polymer clay, I stamped leafy textures from a texture sheet, from which I cut out leaf shapes using a cutter. I also rolled up a snake, and from its pieces, added tiny stalks to the tops of these leaves. I then dripped alcohol inks – sunset, flamingo and watermelon colors – onto the sheets, ensuring they got into all the niches. Using a Q-tip, I removed some ink from the raised surfaces.
After the ink dried, I brushed gold colored Perfect Pearls into the lower half of the charms, again, ensuring that it went into the recesses.
I pressed lightly textured sheets to the back of the charms for better finishing, since the alcohol ink was messily smeared over the back too. After smoothing surfaces and edges and poking tiny holes at the top, off went the charms into the oven for a 25-minute bake.
After the baking, I lightly sanded the raised surfaces to remove more of the alcohol inks and the Perfect Pearls, leaving a colorful canvas of autumn colors and golden shine!
The earrings
I used a length of red wire to match the color scheme of the charms. For each earring, I strung a pre-wired gold loreal seed bead to the wire, placing it near the hole at the top of the leaf, and wound the wire around the leaf’s stalk. I finished the winding with an eye loop. Addition of an earring finding completed the assembly.
I love how much fun these earrings were to make, and how much fun they are to wear!
Do head on over to the reveal and blog hop at Earrings Everyday to see a plethora of autumn themed earrings from talented artists!
Very autumny earrings. Love your handmade leaves.
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Thank you, Janine! The theme was wonderfully inspiring. 🙂
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Such a beautiful tribute to fall! I love that you shared you tricks for making those leaves. Thanks for playing along with me at We’re All Ears. Enjoy the day! Erin
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Thank you for the awesome theme, Erin! I loved how things just flowed smoothly in the making of this one.
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I love the tips that you gave for making the leaves. I think that using the red wire really added to the design. Really pretty leaf earrings.
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Thank you very much, Kathy! I’m glad you found the details useful. 🙂
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The autumn colors really catch your attention with these earrings. Thank you for walking us through your process. I always love to hear/read how things are made.
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Thank you, Hope! It’s always nice to read about ways to make things, and I love it when I learn something from the perusal. 🙂
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Definitely fall! And colorful. And must be lightweight.
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Super-lightweight, and that’s what I like about polymer clay. 🙂 Thanks, Alysen!
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Lovely colours, Anita. Are they inspired by the large leafy trees you see in Bangalore that turn red and burgundy in Autumn? I don’t know the name of the tree but I have a picture of the leaves on my blog (in the Autumn earrings post)
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Divya, it’s not-so-autumn green near where I live and work 🙂 so I took my inspiration from fall colors when I was in the USA a few years ago. I loved the picture in your post though, looks like you had quite the lovely walk!
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Yes, it was lovely. I miss my morning- evening walks now
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Great layering of colors. The subtle shimmer from the gold mica is a perfect touch.
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Thank you, Tammy! 🙂
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Sorry to be hopping so darn late! I love the leaves you made… they look fabulous! What a cute and fun pair of earrings!
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Thank you very much! 🙂
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