Old Cowtown

/ Sarah Collins / Leave a comment

Old Cowtown is located in Wichita, Kansas.  They have relocated some of the old buildings that were built around Wichita to this museum.  It is located next to the Arkansas River on Museum Boulevard.  Across the street is the Botanical Gardens, which is worth a visit.

Settlers used to live in houses that were small, but it  suited their needs.

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They packed their wagons and move to Kansas.  I think they were trying to get out of the over grown city in the East and the mosquitoes in the South.

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Every town had a church. But, in the South every town seemed to have a Baptist Church, a Catholic Church, and a Methodist Church.  Which were usually across the street from each other.

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I made a friend while visiting Old Cowtown.

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At noon, there was a fight on the street of the town.  A couple was robbed.  The wife took the husband gun and shot the robber.  The wife went home, the robber was okay, and the husband went to the saloon.

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Outside to town, there was a farm.  They even had a lazy cow.  She was eating laying down.

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More Polymer Clay Roses

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Below are batches 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 of my polymer clay roses with leaves and stems.

Batch 2:

I took some white clay and blended one edge with some pink clay.  The leaves and stems contains three shades of green and gold clay.

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Batch 3:

The center of the roses were made from the clay left over from Batch 2.   However, there wasn’t enough for three flowers, so I mix a little red with the pink and white for the outer petals.

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Batch 4:

I wanted some flowers that glowed in the dark. I mixed bright pink, yellow, and orange clay with some florescent clay.

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Batch 5:

These red roses were also mixed with some florescent clay, but they do not shine as well as the pink roses in Batch 4.

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Batch 6:

I had just finished the yellow sunflower vase and wanted some yellow roses to put in the vase.  But, yellow roses would just be too plain.  The rose color from stem to the petal tips are hot pink, orange, yellow, and lemon yellow.

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Batch 7:

Some more vase inspired flowers.  I used the leftover clay from the vase.  I gently it mixed together to make the roses.

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Polymer Clay Roses

/ Sarah Collins / 4 Comments

Here is my first attempt at adding a stem and leaves to my polymer clay roses.  I made my first rose when I was a teenager from my brother’s Play-doh.

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The flowers were made from polymer clay that was leftover from previous projects.  The stems are made from floral wire and coated with polymer clay.   Jewelry wire was other option, but it is a lot more expensive than floral wire.

What I learned from the first set was:  How to make the leaves better  and how to better place them in the oven to reduce damaging the stems.

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Vases with Polymer Clay

/ Sarah Collins / 1 Comment

I wanted to see if I could put some polymer clay on a vase, bake it in the oven, and have the clay stick to the vase.  Below is my first vase experiment.  I had a bottle, shape like a light bulb, that was just sitting in a cabinet.

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I figured the best way to get it to stick to the vase, was to put a thin layer of polymer clay around the vase and then put the design on it.  Since it was an experiment, I didn’t want to waste a lot of time with the design.  However, it does glow in the dark.

Since it was a success, I did four other vases.

The Sunflower Vase:  I wanted the top and bottom of the vase to look like the petals were coming from the center of a sunflower.

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The Gold Flowery Vase:  From the beginning I wanted a gold lattice work around the vase.  The flower idea come later.   After it was baked, I applied paint to give it an antique look.

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The Shades of Red Vase:  The original intent was to cover the vase in black, then give it a stain glass appearance.  That idea change when I saw how nice the reds and pinks looked against the black.

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The Flower Vase:  I extrudes some blue/purple clay that was left over from other projects.  The intent for this vase was to have a delicate flowery pattern.

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After the vases were baked in the oven and cooled, I applied polyurentane to seal the clay.   Since the clay is not permanently stuck to the vase, I could probably take a sharp Exacto Knife to any vase that turns out poorly to remove the clay.

Polymer Clay Crosses

/ Sarah Collins / 1 Comment

I spent some time creating crosses from polymer clay, which was left over from all of the other polymer clay projects.

First the pretty crosses:

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The difficult cross:

Folding clay and braiding clay is a little bit challenging.

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Interesting Crosses:

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The weird ones:

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Do You See the Butterflies?

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