Welcome! This is going to be my longest post ever.
Today is my turn in the Blog Hop Tour organized around the new book about epoxy clays: Inspired Remnants, Curious Dreams by Kerin Gale. Some of my work is included in this book. In case you don’t know my work: I am a doll artist from the Netherlands, NIADA and DABIDA member. I use to add animals and other props to my fantasy pieces. I work mainly in hand sculpted porcelain for my dolls and papier mache for animals. I use epoxy clay to make weak parts of the animals stronger. Here you see a few examples of my work:

The nice thing for the visitors of my blog today is that they can win all the prizes listed below. The only thing you have to do to win a prize is to leave your name and addresses as a comment. Winners will be picked by a drawing. As an extra prize I have added an online class on animal making. This class tells you all my secrets about how to start and build an animal of your choice from papier mache.
To give you an impression I show here how to make an open  beak for a duck:

Bend copper (or other non rusty wire) into a loop, a bit wider than  the width of the duck’s head. (I used a Styrofoam egg as base for the head) Cover this both sides with paper masking tape. Let about an inch of the wire stick out. Make a second piece almost twice as wide as the first one with an extra strip of wire placed in the middle.

Bend the two beak parts to hollow shapes and stick the wire ends in the Styrofoam, the wider part on top. This gives you a great base to cover with papier mache or other sculpting material. This method is easy to adjust to other shapes. I also use it for animal ears and that works great.

This is the complete program of this Blog Hop tour

May 1
Kerin Gale
Remnants of Olde: http://RemnantsOfOlde.com/posts

May 2
Alicia Caudle
Altered Bits: http://alteredbits.wordpress.com/

May 3
Lesley Venable
Flatwoods Folk Art: http://www.flatwoodsfolkart.typepad.com/

May 4
Christine Lehto
Lilly Bug Studio: http://lillybugstudio.com/blog/

May 5
Seth Apter
The Altered Page: http://thealteredpage.blogspot.com/

May 6
Nancy Perennec
Little Bit Wired: http://littlebitwired.blogspot.com/

May 7
Jen Cushman
ICE Queen Zine: http://www.iceresin.com/category/inspired-remnants-blog-tour/

May 8
Happy Mother’s Day!

May 9
Beth Robinson
Strange Dolls: http://strangedolls.wordpress.com/

May 10
Brenda Schweder
Brenda Schweder Jewelry: http://www.brendaschweder.com/

May 11
Esther Verschoor
Vanessie Art Dolls: http://vanessies.blogspot.com

May 12
Kecia Deveny
Lemoncholy’s Flight of Fancy: http://www.lemoncholys.blogspot.com/

May 13
Rachel Whetzel
A Year In The Life Of An Art Journal: http://oneyearartjournal.blogspot.com/

May 14
Shannon LeVart
MissFickleMedia.com: http://missficklemediacom.blogspot.com/

May 15
Marlaine Verhelst
Marlaine Verhelst Art Dolls: http://marlaineverhelst.com/blog/

May 16
Lisa Jurist
Mud Hound Studio: http://mudhoundprimitives.blogspot.com/

May 17
Michelle Bernard
Yesterday’s Trash: http://michellereneebernard.blogspot.com/

May 18
Kerin Gale
Remnants of Olde – Alan Rogerson feature: http://RemnantsOfOlde.com/posts

May 19
Facebook Party!
Apoxie Clay & Epoxy Clays Page: https://www.facebook.com/#!/home.php?sk=group_158159677562761

SPECIAL OFFERS DURING THIS TOUR
Book & Online Workshop Bundles – special pricing of $5 off.
All you need to do is put in the name of this blog when you check out through Paypal and you will receive the $5 back.

A) Resin Clay Pendants Workshop + Book = $35 + shipping (only $30 for you)
http://www.etsy.com/listing/63483761/inspired-remnants-book-and-resin-clay

B) Vintage Gentleman Workshop + Book = $40 + shipping (only $35 for you)
http://www.etsy.com/listing/27210387/inspired-remnants-book-and-vintage-gent

C) Both Workshops + Book = $70 + shipping (only $65 for you)
http://www.etsy.com/listing/72931590/inspired-remnants-book-super-bundle-with

SPONSORED PRIZES FOR THIS SITE
The only thing you have to do to win this prizes is leave your name and addresses in a comment. Please note the physical products will only be mailed to addresses in the US. Access to the online workshop and the digital collage sheets can be sent anywhere in the world.

A)   The book  Inspired Remnants, Curious Dreams

B)    One Aves Power Pack (selection of their most popular formulas)  from http://AvesStudio.com

C)    Fluid Chalks Online Workshop by Lesley Venable on her The Art Of Altering site which features many other awesome online workshops  http://theartofaltering.ning.com/group/fluidchalksbackgroundsbeyond

D)  Two Digital Collage Sheets by Alicia Caudle of Altered Bits.  You can see her very unique and cool collection at

http://alteredbits.com/digital-collage-sheets.php

E) Sample pack of Silputty 40 silicone putty mold mix from Silpak.

F) 1 OZ ICE Resin and a mixed metal bezel from http://www.iceresin.com/

G) Online workshop Animal making in papier mache by Marlaine Verhelst

Grand Prizes For Book Reviews*
Any reader that writes a review ~ however short or long~  of Inspired Remnants, Curious Dreams on amazon.com before July 31, 2011 and sends an email with the title “Inspired Remnants Review” to remnants.art@gmail.com will be entered in a drawing to win one of these prizes.  Please note that your honest opinion is wanted on this review.

A) The art piece featured on the cover of the book, “Sacred Totem”

B) Power Pack plus extra Fixit Sculpt clay from Aves Studio http://avesstudios.com/

C) Frozen Charlotte Doll with digital tutorial “How To Crackle Charlottes” from Alicia Caudle of http://alteredbits.com

D)  Resin Clay Pendants online workshop by Kerin Gale from http://MixedMediaArt.ning.com

E)  Vintage Gentleman online workshop by Kerin Gale from http://MixedMediaArt.ning.com

F)  Choice of any one workshop being taught by Kerin and Charley at Art Is You retreat in Petaluma, CA.  The registration fee and workshop cost are both waived.  http://www.art-is-you.com/mysitecaddy/site3/generalinformation-westcoast.htm

G)  One copy each of Jen Cushman’s book, Explore, Create, Resinate and Susan Lenart-Kazmer’s book, Making Connections plus ICE Resin and a selection of bezels all from http://www.iceresin.com/

* Please note prizes include shipping to U.S. addresses only.

Good luck with winning a prize and enjoy the rest of the Tour!
Warm regards
Marlaine Verhelst

I was invited to take part in a new book on epoxy clay: Inspired Remnants, Curious Dreams by Kerin Gale.
Personally I use epoxy clay to make the fragile parts of my animals stronger, covering it with papier mache. I am enthusiastic on the material. The books looks very interesting and beautiful and I can’t wait to see it.
Around the publication of this book a Blog Hop Tour is organized with artists involved in the book. I never took part in a blog hop tour before.
May 15 I will be the hosting blog. If you visit my blog that day and leave a message you can win many sponsored prizes and I will add an online animal class to these prizes. So you all should visit my blog on May 15: http://marlaineverhelst.com/blog

Here you can find the complete schedule of this blog hop tour: http://littlebitwired.blogspot.com/2011/04/inspired-remnants-curious-dreams-online.html

My fellow DABIDA member Esther Verschoor is also part of this book AND part of the Tour. Her blog is scheduled for May 11th.

Finally my kiln is working properly again. After a long time of troubles we found out that the little pin on the lid that makes contact when the lid is closed, was a bit (1/16 of an inch) too short and stopped making contact when the kiln got really hot. I am so glad this is solved now by just making this pin a little bit longer.
I have a question about fabrics: I like to use vintage fabrics but sometimes they have a smell that doesn’t disappear even after washing it. Does anyone now how to handle this?
Thanks a lot,
Marlaine

Finally I found the time to start working with the new clay that was waiting there for me: Flax Paperclay. It is a porcelain with fibers in it that has to be fired. I am having quite a hard time with this clay: it is sticky, hard to smooth and it gets porridge-like easily when I try use water for smoothening. If anyone has more experience with this clay, I would appreciate some advice.
Marlaine