Doll Size Ears of Corn

 

Watch the video here.

This week’s video is going to just the fresh ears of corn. When I started filming I was planning to do both the fresh ears and the corn on the cob that was ready to eat in the same video. However, about half way through what I had planned I realized that I already had a lot of footage filmed and decided to split the one video into two parts. So if everything goes as planned the corn on the cob should hit the channel next Friday.

Now on to the tutorial.

Since the internal structure of our ears of corn won’t really show I am using Original Sculpey. Only a tiny bit is going to show so it will work really well for this project.

Start by rolling a ¼” snake of clay and cut that into about 3” to 3 ½” pieces. This is just the first step in the process and we will be adding some shape to it soon.

For now just make one end come to a rounded point then lay the snakes on your baking surface and bake for about 10 minutes at the recommended temperature for the clay you are using.

Now to give our cob bases some shape, roll some of the same clay out to the thickness of a craft stick and cut that sheet of clay into pieces that measure about 2” by 1”.

Spread a thin layer of liquid clay over one of these small sheets of clay and carefully wrap it around one of the cob bases that have been baked and cooled. Use your hands to make a firm bond and get it smoothly in place.

 

Then at the end of the cob base that has the pointed end blend this clay sheet into the point to create a smooth transition between the core and the sheet.

Once you have all the cob bases covered and you are happy with them bake them at the recommended temperature for 15 minutes.

 

 

 

Meanwhile, we can prep the paper we will be using for the husks that will cover our ears of corn.

 

For the corn husks that we will be wrapping around the ears of corn I thought about what would be the easiest to use to give the effect I was going for. In the end I opted to use wrapping tissue in white. The first step is to cut it into strips that we can work with. I chose to cut some 4 ½” strips the width of the paper sheet (I cut 2 of these) then I cut those across to give me 4 pieces that were still 4 ½” by whatever half the width was. The important thing was for it to fit on my work tile. Then I painted those pieces of tissue with a light green, I used Lime Sorbet color but use whatever you have that is close to the color of a fresh cob of corn. I did protect my work tile with some waxed paper just to make clean up easier. I also laid the wet sheets on some waxed paper to dry so that they wouldn’t stick to anything.

I only painted one side of these because that will give some variation in color by using both sides showing when we add it to the corn cobs.

Allow this to dry.

For the corn silk at the top of the ears I decided to use some cheap pale yellow yarn from Dollar Tree. I cut about 3 short pieces for each ear of corn that were around 1 ½” long. Then I put them on a strip of tape to hold them just like I do with pretty much any small items I want to paint. I then used a toothpick to fray out one end to make it look like the silk. I then colored the frayed end with a dark brown alcohol marker. You could use a dark brown paint in place of the marker if you wish. Allow to dry completely.

Since I found in my experimenting with this project that sometimes the pointed part of the corn cob base showed just a bit at the top of the ear I added just a bit of the same green paint I used on the paper for the husk to color just the tip of each ear. This way if it does peek out just a bit no one will notice it.

 

 

Once everything was dry it was time to start putting this together. We need to start with the silk and for that I used some super glue. That will hold it in place until we add the husks which will do a lot more to hold everything in place.

 

At this time I also added some skinny pieces of the husk paper that I had painted with a dark green paint. Personally I would leave these off if the ears of corn are going to be handled very much.

Once this all dries we can add the first layer of husks to the ears of corn. For the first layer of corn husk we are going to cut 4 or 5 strips of the paper we painted earlier for each ear of corn. Each strip should be about ¾” wide and the 4 ½” I used Mat Mod Podge to attach these strips to the ear of corn being careful to leave the tops free and not glued down. Cover the ear of corn really well and let the Mod Podge dry.

 

While the Mod Podge is drying is a good time to add some shading on the remaining husk paper. Use a slightly darker green and just dry brush a bit a bit of color over the light green paint. This will let the husk pieces stand out a bit from each other when glued in place.

Once the Mod Podge on that first layer of husks is dry trim the loose ends into rounded points.

Now cut the paper that you added the shading to into strips about ½” wide then cut one end of each to a rounded point to look like the husk on a real ear of corn.

Now it is just a matter of cutting each of these pieces to the length you want then using the Mat Mod Podge attach them to the ears of corn, leaving those rounded tips free. I like to put about 3 of these on each ear of corn.

To bring these more to life I now added a bit of a wash using two darker greens as well as a cream color paint. I just wanted a very thin watery wash for this, so just a drop of paint in some water. The mixture should dry fairly translucent when you are done. Let this dry and add more until you are happy with the results.

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.