Sandy Camp Review

Sandy Camp was absolutely delightful. There were four and a half days of fun, fellowship and clay play. It was truly a retreat. Except for watching a 30 minute demonstration two or three times a day, all our time was spent making things of clay. With each demonstrator, we learned something new that we could take back into the tent to try out.

The store was only open a couple of hours a day. This allowed the vendors and staff to play along with everyone else. Left is a photo inside of the store. In the background, left a gentleman is standing in front of our booth.

At school we learned to give a "book report" a most dreaded task to say the least. However as the years have gone by I have learned to enjoy book reports and will often share with our guild the goodies I have gleaned from one book or another.

This is not a book report, just an overview of the wonderful demonstrators at Sandy Camp. (OK, I may not be so wonderful, but I loved doing the demo. )

Sandy Camp Demonstrators & Demo Notes:

1. Jill Kollmann: Jewelry, pendant with wirework.
Excellent demonstration with a handout. Her demo was, what she calls, “Fusion of Wire and Polymer Clay”. A clay cabochon is captured in wirework with swirling wires, beads and tiny sculpted details. You can see some of her work on her Etsy site.
http://www.jkollmann.etsy.com

2. Victoria Hepfner: Boxes made using cookie cutters.
This was NOT what I expected. It was so much more!! The lids on her boxes went all the way to the bottom of the inside, bottom box. Like a candy box. The long lids allowed for both a nice, snug fit and the ability to have beautifully decorative sides. The Technique was developed accidentally by Brenda Urquhart and demonstrated by Victoria.

3. Penni Jo Couch. I showed how to make clean molded parts that are ready to use immediately after molding, how to de-mold, ideas for using molded parts in a project and how to make cabochons with embedded slices of millifiori canes. Everyone got a copy of the cabochon project. Left: a sample cabochon.

NOTE: A video of molding an de-molding is on our website's home page .

I also demonstrated how to sculpt a calla lily and gave everyone a pattern.
http://www.bestflexiblemolds.com

4. Patty McElhiney: Wow, Incredible hollow beads! This demo was loaded with all kinds of info, from all sizes of lentil beads, styles of hollow beads, to hollow spool shaped beads. She showed some of the home items that could be used to make the lentils and how to treat a dowel rod to make a form for the spool beads. Lastly, she showed how to make a filigree bead over cornstarch packing peanuts squished into a bead shape. Wonderful demo, filled with info and fun.


5. Dawn Schiller: Fun faces in bezels.
She had a super layout of the shapes needed to make a face. She also had a simple way of putting the shapes into the bezel and then blending them together to make a face without a nose. The nose was last and added great character to the face. A most amazing demonstration. -- She only used a nail tool to do all the sculpting. cool. She was amazing.
http://www.oddfae.com

The clay was a polymer clay from Brazil called bozzi. It evidently is super to use and easy to condition, and strong and is available here. http://www.clayalley.com/dollclays.htm

6. Marie Segal: Extruder Fun:
This was also unexpected. It always amazes me at how much I don't know. She showed how many of the shapes we might never use go together to make fabulous patterns. Also, if loading more than one color into the barrel, the last color that goes into the extruder will be on the outside of the extrusion until it is all gone. The potential of the stacking is really exciting as are the patterns that can be formed using the extruder.
Ideas- plaids, quilt blocks, etc. Lots of ideas a-brewing in my brain and a few notes.
http://www.mariesegal.com

7. Christi Friesen: fun and a great demo, a koi pond.
This project was done as a stand alone tiny artwork or as a pin or pendant. The project was a tiny “pond” with lily pads, stones, a koi fish and resin water. She does not spend much time conditioning clay, just using it as it comes from the block. I'm guessing it is premo but could not see the brand from where I sat. She is a fabulous teacher and such fun. 'Can't wait to try this one.
http://www.cforiginals.com

8. syndee holt (no caps on purpose) Mosaics using polymer clay and glass drops. A very, very informative demonstration from preparing the background, creating the clay tiles, gluing the parts, grout tips from choosing the color to mixing and spreading it into the spaces, and finishing the piece. Polyform supplied a frame and tiny cutters to make clay tiles and decorate the frame for a contest.
http://www.synspage.com

9. Tony Aquisto, creator of Kato Clay. Fun, tongue in cheek history of polymer clay, a 40 minute power point presentation. Very clever and informative :-).

The retreat was relaxing, encouraging and I came home rarin' to get clayin'!!!