Doll Size Toaster Pastries pt 1

 

Watch the video here.

This week I am showing you how to make some toaster pastries for the dolls to enjoy. This will be part 1 of a 2 part project and we will make just basic whole toaster pastries. I will be showing you how to chalk them to look like the ones fresh out of the box as well as after a light toasting.

This is a really easy project and would be a good one if you just have a bit of experience working with polymer clay.

To begin we need to condition the clay we are using as well as mix a dough color of clay. If you are not familiar with what I mean by conditioning the clay I highly recommend you check out my polymer clay tutorial playlist on my channel. You can find it here. In that series of videos I go over a lot of the terms and techniques of working with polymer clay.

To get the dough color of clay I mixed some white clay and some Fimo Sahara clays together. You could use any light beige type color in place of the Sahara. I mixed them in equal parts to create a nice light dough/pastry color of clay.

 

I also created a couple of patterns to help me cut my pastries all the same size. For the patterns I used some 8 square to the inch graph paper. I have a PDF I downloaded from online that I print out a few sheets when I need then but you could certainly buy the graph paper or just use plain paper and measure and draw the pattern that way. I like the graph paper because it is so easy to measure out my pattern quickly.

The pattern for the pastry measures 1” by 1 3/8” and the pattern for the filling measures ¾” by 1 1/8”.

Now we can roll out the clay. Since the filling in our pastries today will never be seen I am using the same clay for the filling as for the outside of the pastries. You could use any color for this “filling” this week.

 

Since we need a thin sheet of clay I used 2 of the Hobby Lobby version of skinny sticks to help me get a nice thin even sheet.

 

 

 

 Once rolled I used the patterns to cut two pieces from the larger pattern and 1 from the filling pattern. 

 

 

Be sure to use some cornstarch on your work surface to help prevent sticking. Be very careful when lifting/moving the thin pieces of clay. Use your clay knife to help lift it off the work surface so you don’t stretch it out of shape.

 

 

 

 

Layer the pieces like a sandwich with the filling piece centered in the middle between the other two pieces.

 

Now we need to smooth the top layer of clay down around the filling and seal it to the bottom layer. I used a large ball tool but you could use the clean handle of a large paint brush or your finger tip. You want to have a shape like shown in this picture. Trim to size with your clay knife and the pattern.

 

 

 

 

Now use a pointed tool like the pointed dotting tool I used or a toothpick to make the little holes that are on the pastries in real life. I tried to make neat rows alternating between 3 and 4 holes in each row offsetting them so they lined up between the holes in the rows above and below. Like in this photo.

 

Now we can use some yellow ocher artist chalk and an eye shadow brush to add just a bit of color over the surface of the pastry. If you are making your pastries to look like they are fresh out of the box your pastry is ready to bake.

 

If you want to make your pastry look like it has been through the toaster add just a bit of a light rust brown color chalk around the edges and at the corners. Then follow up with a bit more of the ocher color to blend it.

Now time to bake, follow the instructions on your package of clay for temperature and bake for 12 minutes.

Allow to cool all the way to room temperature before the next step.

Next we are going to frost our pastries, for that I am using some liquid clay. If you want just white you can use the white liquid Sculpey and it will be perfect and I am going to do that on one of mine. But I want some color of two of my pastries so I need to add color to the white liquid clay. To add color I use oil paint. If you not familiar with this process I again recommend you you check out my clay 101 series to learn more about liquid clay and how to use it.

To make the caramel color frosting (like on the brown sugar cinnamon pastries in real life) I used white oil paint with a touch of burnt umber and a touch of yellow ocher.

For the pink frosting I used white paint with a touch of rose madder paint.

Mix a very small amount of the mixed paint into the liquid clay. Just use enough to color the liquid clay. Then put a drop of each of the colors you mixed onto any bake-able surface and do a test bake for 10 minutes at the same temperature you will be baking the project at. This will tell you a couple of things. Since the colors do sometimes shift a lot when doing this you will know if you have the color you want. And most importantly you will be able to determine if the clay will cure. If you add too much paint to it you will find it remains sticky and not set up when baked and cooled. You do have to wait until it is cooled to room temperature to check this.

Once you are sure that the colors are the way you want them to be spread a small amount on the top center of each pastry. Then if desired sprinkle on some tiny no-hole micro beads to act as sprinkles. Once you have them decorated the way you want them bake again at the recommended temperature for another 10 minutes and allow to cool before touching them.

 

 

And there you have it toaster pastries for the dolls to enjoy.

In part 2 we will be making pastries that are broken open or bitten so we can see the filling.

 

As always I do want to sincerely thank all of you for watching my videos and reading my blog posts. It means so much to me that you are supporting me in this way. If I could ask you all to do just a bit more by subscribing to the channel and liking the videos and leaving comments. Those help more than you can imagine. Also if you could pass the links on to your friends I would appreciate it so much.

Doll Size Potted Plant

 

Watch the video here.

The first step is to start the prep work on the pot we are going to use. I have some of these cool shaped containers from yogurt that I decided to use. Look through what you have and find a container you like.

I do want to take off the edge/rim at the top of the container. I don’t like how it sticks out so I used some scissors to simply cut it off. Once you get your scissors lined up with where the edge bends out it is really easy to cut because in that area the plastic is a bit thinner.

Since my container had a label that was removable I was able to remove it and I had a nice white pot at this point and I could have just used it that way. But I wanted to add some color to mine.

Since the container was very shiny I used a sanding block (you could use sand paper) to rough up the surface a bit. I then wiped it down with some Isopropyl Alcohol (you could use white vinegar) this removes any dust from the sanding process and any oils that might interfere with the paint.

If your container has printing on the surface instead of a removable label I suggest painting it with a coat of white paint then painting it with the color you are going to use. If you are going to make a really dark color pot you could use black for the base coat.

Now just paint the outside and down a bit on the inside at the top. You will most likely need multiple coats of paint to get full coverage.

 

While the painting is going on let’s work on the plant.

For the plant I have created a free downloadable pattern for you to use. You can find it here. You can make as many plants with the pattern as you would like, you could even sell or give away the finished plants just please don’t give away/sell my pattern. The download contains 3 items, a PDF if you want to hand cut the pieces as well as a PNG that can be used in your electronic cutting machine. The 3^rd item is a text file with sizing instructions and tips for using the PNG with your cutting machine.

I did my best to try and place more of the palm fronds on a page but the Cricut cutting area wasn’t big enough for more that two, so for each frond of your plant you will need a separate sheet of paper. We are using printer paper, and mine is super cheap so it is pretty lightweight.

The pattern is designed with the two pieces on each sheet being a mirror image of the other one. So you will need to keep track of which side gets glued together.

You will also need a piece of 20 gauge stem wire for each frond cut about 9” long. 

 

Start with a bead of thick tacky glue down the center stem area of each frond then coat the remainder of frond with a coat of Mod Podge.

 

 

 

 

Add the wire to the center. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then add the other frond on top creating a sandwich with the wire in the center. Carefully lift this off your work surface and place standing up in a container so that the leaves are not touching anything. Allow to dry completely.

Once the glue/Mod Podge dries go over each frond and do any trimming you need to do to neaten them up.

 

Once you are happy you can gather some green craft paints (I also ended up using a yellow) and paint the leaves.

 

 

 

 

While the paint on the leaves dries we can move back to working on the pot providing the paint on it is dry.

 

 

 

 

The next step on the pot is to fill it with some foam. I’m using some floral foam from the dollar store but you could even use styrofaom packing, any kind of solid foam pieces that you can fill the pot with. Use some Tacky glue to hold it in place while we are working.

Once the foam is in place let the glue dry at least most of the way. Note I didn’t mention it in the video but you could use hot glue for this if you are very careful to not melt the foam.

Once you are happy with the way the top of the foam looks and you have most of the top filled in to the edge of the pot it is time to paint the top of the foam with any dark brown craft paint. Ideally we will never see this paint but just in case there are thin areas in our “soil” we don’t want to see the color of the foam through those areas. Just put on a nice thick coat of paint and allow to dry.

Once dry if you find you have been a bit sloppy with the painting job take a few moments to touch up the painting until you are happy with it.

Once the paint is dry we can add the “soil” and the plant.

We do need to add both the “soil” and the plant at the same time because once the thick layer of glue dries it is next to impossible to add the plant stems without damaging the plant.

So start by adding a thick layer of a foam friendly glue. I would normally use tacky glue but I am almost out of tacky glue and didn’t want to use it all up on this project. Instead I used some school glue. Basically any white glue will work for this.

Once the glue is added to the top of the foam spread it out as well as you can. Try not to have any bare areas. I use a toothpick to spread mine and for me that works really well.

Now we add the soil. For soil I used my go-to, very well dried used coffee grounds. The key things in that description are very well dried and used coffee grounds. As long as you follow that these will work really well. Just pour them over the wet glue, spread them out and pour of the excess.

Now we add the plant fronds, I’m grouping mine in the center of the pot since I have something like a palm plant in mind.

As for the number of fronds for your plant you could have made as many as you wished to, as long as they will fit in the pot and look nice.

Now let the glue dry somewhere that the pot will not get knocked down.

 

 

Once the glue holding the soil in place is completely dry you can arrange the leaves the way you want to make the plant look the way you want it to.

 

 

As always I do want to sincerely thank all of you for watching my videos and reading my blog posts. It means so much to me that you are supporting me in this way. If I could ask you all to do just a bit more by subscribing to the channel and liking the videos and leaving comments. Those help more than you can imagine. Also if you could pass the links on to your friends I would appreciate it so much.

Doll Size Cooked Green Beans

 

Watch the video here.

 

This week we are making some cooked green beans to go along with the fresh ones we made last week. Again we need to start with a clay color that closely matches what we are making. I started out with some of the leftover leaf green color I had left from last week. If you have leaf green clay go ahead and use it. If not and you want to mix your own leaf green like I did last week here is a photo of the colors I used. They were used in approximately equal parts. 

 

 

Once you have leaf green mix in some black to make the cooked bean color. I actually cooked some green beans and tried several combinations of colors to come up with what matched the best for me. I found that 2 parts leaf green with 1 part black was the best match so that is what I am using.

 

Once you have a color you are happy with you can start making your green beans. You have some choices on this step. I show how to make both whole green beans and cut ones. You can make either or both depending on how your dolls are going to be serving them.

For the whole ones just make them the same way we made the fresh ones last week. Form a ball then roll to shape. The details for that are on last week’s tutorial. The only difference is we get to skip all the steps involving the stems because those are generally cut off prior to cooking the beans in real life.

For cut green beans it is even similar, just roll the clay into a snake about 1/8” in diameter and cut into pieces about ¾” long. The snake doesn’t have to be perfectly ¾” it can vary a bit because in real life beans aren’t all the exact same size.

 

Once you have as many beans formed as you think you need, bake them at the temperature suggested for your clay for about 10 minutes and allow to cool to room temperature.

 

 

 

There are so many possibilities for finishing the green beans and I just showed a few in the video. That being said if you have a different green bean dish you want/need help recreating for your dolls let me know and I will try to include it in a future tutorial.

For all of our platings of green beans we are going to use some Satin Mod Podge to act as both our glue and as a means to make the beans look slightly wet, just like the real thing. I like to work on a small piece of parchment paper to combine just a bit of the Mod Podge with the beans then transfer and arrange them on a clean sheet of parchment paper.

For the first plating I used the whole green beans and once I had them arranged the way I wanted them I cut tiny bits of some yellow embroidery floss to act as some lemon zest. In real life this is my favorite way to serve green beans so I had include it here. I like to use a piece of raw spaghetti as my tool to lift tiny lightweight things like this floss bits. Just dampen the end slightly and it will have just enough stick to pick up the floss bits and then they will stick to the Mod Podge.

 

For a more simple plating I just added some “salt” to the pile of cut green beans. I started the same as for the first one by mixing a bit of Satin Mod Podge in with the green beans. Then after transferring them to the clean parchment paper I just added a sprinkle of white sand. Once the Mod Podge dries this will look like a sprinkle of coarse salt has been added. If you have some black sand you could add some “pepper” also.

Allow the Mod Podge plenty of time to cure, I do find it is best to turn the piles of green beans over so the bottom side gets more air circulation after a few hours. This will help everything to dry completely.

Once the Mod Podge has dried all the way you can display them as desired.

As always I do want to sincerely thank all of you for watching my videos and reading my blog posts. It means so much to me that you are supporting me in this way. If I could ask you all to do just a bit more by subscribing to the channel and liking the videos and leaving comments. Those help more than you can imagine. Also if you could pass the links on to your friends I would appreciate it so much.

Doll Size Fresh Green Beans

 

Watch the video here.

This week I am so happy to be back to filming tutorials for all of you. I am sorry for the long absence but life got in the way and I just wasn’t able to film for the channel. I have set up things to hopefully keep me on track with the channel this year and into the future. So happy new year and thank you for stopping by to learn how to make some green beans for the dolls.

I was initially going to be making both fresh green beans and cooked ones but I decided it would be best to do two videos this on the fresh green beans and then next week a separate tutorial on the cooked ones. I was afraid trying to cover both would make the video way too long and be overwhelming both you the viewer and for me.

Since we making our beans from polymer clay if you haven’t worked with it a lot here is a link to my Clay 101 playlist on YouTube. I do recommend taking a look at some of those videos if you aren’t feeling confident in your clay working skills.

 

The first step in any clay project is to condition the clay. I did that off camera. Since I needed to mix my clay color I did that as the same time. If you have a leaf green clay go ahead and use that. If not here are the colors I mixed to get the color I used. I used all the colors in approximately equal parts. You can mix a similar color if you a good range of clay on hand in your stash.

 

Be sure work with the clay until it is well conditioned to make forming the beans easier.

Once you get the color you think is correct go ahead and roll a small bit into a snake about 1/16” in diameter and a couple of inches long. Lay on a plain paper plate and bake for about 10 minutes. This will do two things. First off it will let you check what color your clay will be when it is baked off. Green clays usually stay pretty true to the raw color when baked but it is always a good idea to check. And even more importantly this will become the stems to go onto the ends of some of your green beans. Because of this I try to lay mine stem snake out in a curved shape so it makes better looking stems.

Once the clay is conditioned break off pieces and form small balls. They can range from just a bit bigger than ¼” to just under 3/8” in diameter. You want a variety of sizes in the range so that your beans are each a slightly different size. After all in real life they would each be a bit different in length. Each ball will become 1 green bean.

You will also need a very small amount of a light beige color of clay. I used Fimo Sahara but any similar color will work. Just barely condition this so that you can work with it and form it into a ball on your work surface.

Now using your fingers and working with one clay ball at a time roll the ball into a snake with one end very pointed. I try to go no longer than 2 ¼” for most of the beans with a few up to 2 ½” long. Be sure to make some shorter too.

 

Then add just a tiny drop of a clear liquid polymer clay to the not pointed end.

 

 

 

Add a tiny bit of the beige clay with a pointy tool.

 

 

 

Then add a small piece of the stem snake.

 

 

 

 

Use you fingers to shape the end of the bean so it looks right.

 

 

Make some of your beans longer and some shorter. Some pretty straight and some curved. If you make them all the same size and shape they loose the look of the real thing.

Add all the beans to your baking surface, I use a plain paper plate. And bake the beans at the temperature called for on your clay package. Since I am using multiple brands of clay with different baking temperatures and I know my current oven has a habit of drifting in temperature I usually bake my clay at 225°F for 10 minutes.

 

 

Allow the beans to cool and they are ready to use in you doll scene.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next week come back and learn how to make some cooked green beans for the dolls.

As always I do want to sincerely thank all of you for watching my videos and reading my blog posts. It means so much to me that you are supporting me in this way. If I could ask you all to do just a bit more by subscribing to the channel and liking the videos and leaving comments. Those help more than you can imagine. Also if you could pass the links on to your friends I would appreciate it so much.