Spring Strawberries by Irit Shalom

Spring Strawberries

Designed by Irit Shalom 

Hello my dear crafty friends and welcome to my new tutorial made for the Makin's Clay® blog.

As you maybe remember last month I decided to make a couple of flower tutorials  made with Makin's Clay® and totally different techniques. This is my second tutorial and this time, as my tribute to Spring, I made this strawberry blossoms with strawberries piece. Last month I explained the die cutting of dry Makin's Clay® sheet techniques.  This time it's hand made, scissor cut flowers with a little help of other techniques.

So lets make this beauty!

Materials:

Makin’s Clay® White, Brown, Olive, Yellow

Makin’s Professional®Roller and Cutters set®

Makin’s Clay® Professional Clay Tools® 

Makin’s Professional® Cutting Mat

Makin's® Ultimate Clay Extruder™-Disc #9 from this set

Makin’s Clay® Cutters-3 pc Round, 3 pc Flower

Makin’s Clay® Cutters-4 pc. Flower

Strawberry push mold  - (or Makin's® Fruits Push Mold includes a strawberry)

Leaf shaped flat dies or leaf templates - (or Makin's® Leaves Push Mold, or the Flower/Leaf Clay Cutter Set includes a leaf cutter)  

ColourArte Silk Acrylics 

Clear glaze

Paintbrush, Scissors 

Frame

Instructions:

1. Roll a think sheet of White Makin’s Clay®  clay using  the clay roller from the Makin’s Professional® Roller and Cutters set® set over the Makin’s Professional® Cutting Mat.

2. Use medium size circle cutter form 3 pc Makin's Clay® 3 pc. Round Cutter set and make a few circles from your rolled white clay.

3. Now let's see how to make strawberry blossoms. First,  I checked the number of petals and the general shape of those blossoms. We need 5 petals flowers and they are round shaped ones.  Makin's® Flower/Leaf Clay Cutter Set does include a 5 petal flower, but if you do not have this set, follow the steps below to create your blossoms.

•  Divide the cut circles to 5 as much as possible equal sectors using Makin's Clay®  tools and make the central notch. (See circle #1 from the left ).
• Use your fine scissors and cut between the sectors as shown on flower #2 on this photo.
• Now round the petals with scissors (#3 on this photo).
• Flatten the hand cut flower a bit- not too much- with the roller (#4 on the photo).
• Make veins with any tool you feel comfortable with and shape the flower (#5 on the photo).
• Make as many flowers as your need. For this project I made just 5.

4. Make leaves with a die, but just as a shape maker.  I didn't die cut the leaves and used the die over the fresh clay. Then hand cut the shape around the image as shown.Those leaves are pretty much general shaped ones; so you can also free hand cut your own leaves without any die or template.  Optional:  use Makin's® Leaves Push Mold, or the Makin's® Flower/Leaf Clay Cutter Set includes leaf cutters.

5. Make the back of the flowers using hand mixed Makin's Clay®.  I used a mix of the same size Yellow and Olive green and just made an initial mix with marbled look. Then use Makin’s Clay® Cutters smallest Flower cutter and make 5 pieces from the mixed clay as the bottoms of your blossoms. 

6. Make the blossom center with Makin's® Ultimate Clay Extruder™  using the disc #9.  Then arrange a few round strips together to make your blossom's centers.

7. Use ColourArte Silk Acrylics (gel medium based) to paint the leaves and the finished blossoms with the centre on them. 

Make three strawberries using a mold with White Makin's Clay® and paint them as shown.

8. Make the arrangement base by rolling Brown Makin's Clay® thin and using the medium flower cutter from the 4 pc set.  This piece is not really seen, so you can use any other natural color too.

9. Arrange your leaves, blossoms and berries as shown.

Cover them with glaze and enjoy your Spring project!