Recycling glass might have got much easier than it used to be around here, now that we can put it all straight in our ordinary recycling bin, but I do often feel I ought to be able to make more of jam jars and the like; they feel like a free resource that should be crafted especially as we currently have lots of baby food jars too (I know, I know…)

So this week I had to provide a craft for children in a group we go to so I took jars along with us. I also took the flower cutters I have (made for icing) but I’ve blogged before about hand making fimo flowers, which is just as interesting? As it happened, the kids made as many of their own flowers as they cut them out and were very creative.

Amazingly, they spent all day poring over their creations and as a craft it worked brilliant, especially for using up scrap polymer clay. The results were stunning.

The premise is really simple. Polymer clay will hold to glass around a shape so long as there is a continuous loop. The clay bakes and contracts and so a loop will grip on to the jar. You can varnish for extra stickiness and gloss and strength to the pieces but it isn’t necessary. The kids built up designs of looping stems, leaves and flowers to make vases, candle holders, pen pots… You name it. The front left one, while clay intensive, has holes pushed to the glass in every flower to let candle light out afterwards.

The kids all interpreted their designs in their own way and as you can see, my Maddy did her very own thing again! I can see us coming back to this idea again and I’ve been collecting some inspiration of my Fimo Pinterest board.

[widgets_on_pages id=”Simple Crafts Rating: 3/5″]