Turtle Tutorial

Hello all!! Here is the turtle tutorial as I promised as well as some of the pictures from the wedding! Hope you enjoy... I tried to make the tutorial as straightforward as possible but if there are any questions please let me know :).

Use a bakeable clay, and a small sea shell

Break the clay in half, it should be a little larger than the shell and twice as thick

and then roll into a ball. Make sure that there are no cracks.

Begin to form the head by pinching and smoothing.

Use a small knife to cut the sides into arms

The end area you can pinch off into a tail, shape the arms and legs as you do this.

Then place the shell on top making sure that the clay goes in fairly deep

so that it will not fall off.

Add eyes with different colored clay and a smile, and then smooth out all cracks. 

Bake for however long

the clay instructions say. The shell stays on during the baking process.

And then add a thick base coat. You can then add other designs on your turtles shell.

Spray or paint on a gloss or acrylic sealer afterwards.

                                            The Wedding

Bride with all the bridesmaids and groomsmen

It rained just beforehand but turned out to be a beautiful day..

Me

The lovely table arrangements...

The cake

Under the sea

  Around this time of year until late October baby sea turtles begin to hatch along the coast of Florida. Five species of sea turtles inhabit Florida's waters during some time of the year but only two lay their eggs here. Florida's nesting sea turtles include the loggerhead (most common), and leatherback (least common). During the summer months, there are approximately 50,000 sea turtles in Florida. This makes it the most important nesting area in the United States. My family and I often go to the beach at night to watch these massive sea creatures magically appear out of the water and scoot up the sand to lay their eggs, and then vanish mysteriously back into the dark depths of the ocean.
My second oldest sister Amber is getting married at Anna Maria Island on Saturday, and she asked me a while back to make clay magnet turtles as gifts for the guests. I procrastinated quite a while so now I'm rushing to finish them this last week. She also asked me to play "That's Amore" my grandmothers favorite song at the recital dinner, so its time to break out my flute and music and polish up a few rhythms here and there. I will probably post a tutorial on how to make one of these turtles over the next few days just for fun :). And perhaps when we go to visit we will get lucky enough to see a real sea turtle hatching as well! Hope you enjoy!
~ Heidi

Which one is your favorite?