How to Make a Broken Dish Pendant

 

This tutorial was originally posted on Crafting a Green World.

Pro tip: If you pretend that your dinnerware aesthetic is mismatched Fiestaware, then it doesn't matter how many dishes your kids break, because you can always just go buy another random plate and it'll fit right in. And bonus points for style, because broken Fiestaware is awesome for crafting!

Of course, you can use all kinds of broken dishes for crafting, but I am particularly fond of this colorful and cute broken dish pendant that I recently made from my dearly departed yellow Fiestaware plate. It's easier than you think to cut ceramics with a couple of standard tools, and there are loads of ways to finish off the pendant to your taste. This broken dish pendant is a fun upcycling project, and you get to use power tools--what could be better?

Tools & Supplies

To make your own broken dish pendant you will need:

Broken Dish

The local thrift store is my favorite place to buy crafting supplies, and I have no qualms about shattering even the cutest thrifted plate just to make mosaic tesserae or broken dish pendants. I'm equally fond of upcycling my own broken possessions, which is why I have that sad little stack of broken Fiestaware!

Dremel with Diamond Bit Cutting Wheel

 

Obviously, you can substitute whatever variable-speed rotary tool you prefer, but my good old Dremel 3000 has been doing right by me for at least a decade now, so I don't have experience with any other brands.

Grinder or Sandpaper (optional)

You do want to grind or sand away any sharp edges or snags, but you can leave the just plain irregular or uneven bits alone if you're not feeling picky.

Jewelry Findings

There's a lot of scope for imagination here! You'll see me finishing my pendant with soldered edges and a double barrel swivel, but you can use any findings and method you prefer, or even just use a tile bit to drill a hole right through your piece for hanging.

1. Cut the pendant shape from your dish

The secret to this project is just how stinking easy it is to cut ceramics with the correct tools. Here, I'm using an old-school Dremel 3000 and a diamond cutting wheel. That's really all you need!  Notice that I'm doing this cutting in my sink, shamefully getting water droplets all over my Dremel. That's because the most important piece to this puzzle is keeping your work surface wet: it reduces friction and lowers the temperature (caused by friction), so your piece is less likely to crack and your cutting wheel will last longer.

2. Sand or Grind the Edges of Your Pendant (optional)

I definitely could have cut this circle more neatly (if you're worried about making wonky cuts, choose a super simple shape, like a triangle, for your first few pendants. Save the wonky-looking circles for experts like me!), but the soldered edges that I'm planning on will cover a lot of flaws. All I did, then, was switch out my Dremel's cutting wheel for a grinding bit to grind down one jagged bit and round the pendant's edges. Rounding the edges ALWAYS makes a cut piece look more professional!

3. Rig the Pendant for Hanging

You have SO many options for actually turning your broken dish into a pendant!

• Use epoxy glue to adhere a bail directly to the back of the pendant.
• Use a diamond drill bit to drill a hole through the top of the pendant.
• Wrap the pendant in wire, and twist to make a loop for hanging.
• Solder around the pendant, then solder on a jump ring.

For a piece any bigger than this particular pendant, I like the look of drilling a hole directly through the dish, but this little Fiestaware logo pendant is only 1" in diameter! Did any of y'all also learn how to solder during the soldered microscope slide jewelry craze? If so, you'll know that I burnished copper foil tape onto the pendant's edges, brushed them with flux, then soldered them with lead-free silver solder. A larger dollop of solder on top allows you to fix the hanger. 

 There are SO MANY fun things to do with broken dish pendants like these. You can turn them into necklaces or charm bracelets, add them to suncatchers or windchimes, or embellish pull chains or garlands. Supersize your broken dish pendants and use them as Christmas ornaments or gift tags, or decoupage or paint on top of them to make signage or wall art. Let me know what you're going to turn YOUR broken dish pendant into in the comments below!

History of Fashion Study: How to Drill a Hole in a Shell

Syd and I started a History of Fashion study this summer, using this book as our spine:



It's a very leisurely study, with lots of handicrafts, so we've actually spent most of the summer on the first unit, Prehistoric Fashion. We studied how animal skins are prepared, how the first sewing needles were invented, we worked with leather, we learned about the invention of weaving, we did some weaving, we learned about the first types of jewelry, and we crafted with shells.

I'll give you the full run-down of this unit later, because it's been awesome, but first: if you want to craft with shells, you probably at some point need to know how to drill a hole in a shell. I'm here to help you with that!




As you can see in the image above, you only need two things: a drill and a suitable drill bit. You can go old-school prehistoric and use a hand drill, or you can use what I use, which is a Dremel. It's so high-speed that it drills through pretty much anything as if that thing is butter.

If you use a Dremel, you also have a lot of choice in what bit you use. I used an engraving bit because that's what I had on hand and I was too lazy to go to the store, but I regret that a little now, because the bit was a bit too soft and I managed to wear it down in the course of drilling through just a few shells. I'd have done better to put the shells in a very shallow pan of water so that I could drill them wet, but it would have been best if I'd used an actual drill bit, such as a narrow tungsten carbide bit or even a diamond bit.

Ah, well... Next time!

Regardless, didn't these shells come out perfectly?



I'll show you another time how Syd and I painted and glittered them, and all the random stuff that we did with them, but right now Will is taking a practice SAT exam at the table near the computer, and I can't wander off with my camera and photograph shells because I have to supervise her and remind her every ten minutes that she can't actually make snarky comments about the questions out loud during the actual SAT...

Homeschooled kids. I tell you what.

P.S. Now that I'm no longer the editor of Crafting a Green World, I spend all my social media time on this blog's Facebook page. I share interesting links to homeschool resources and craft tutorials, and I take weird photos of my WIPs and our homeschool day and put them there. Come see me!

Making Button Bobby Pins (with the Babies)

This is a project that I never would have made on my own.

My little girls, however, have a seemingly endless thirst for hair pretties. I have bought them any number of plain, serviceable hair bands and barrettes, loudly proclaiming each time that no, I will certainly NOT pay that much for the fancy hair pretties, seeing as how we can make them just as well ourselves.

The girls finally having noticed that, for all my talk, we have not yet actually made ourselves any fancy hair pretties...

Let the crafting of hair pretties begin.

I don't actually have
in front of me, but I remember these button bobby pins (and their simplicity), and if something can be made using hot glue, then that something can be made by me.

And the littles, who of course are permitted to wield the hot glue gun whenever they want, too: Unfortunately, I really didn't set up this activity well, and so although the girls seemed to enjoy themselves, and made button bobby pin after button bobby pin until we have to find the hiding places of more bobby pins in order to make more, I was frustrated by having to help them in the midst of my unwieldy set-up (me standing across the table from them the entire time, with the glue gun plugged in on Sydney's far side so that the cord was always in the way, and the button bins deep and full and hard to sift through), and I was too busy battling hot glue and button bins to actually get to make any of these pins, myself.

Next time, I'll sit between the girls, with the hot glue gun in front of us, and I'll set out some dishes for the more efficient and effective sorting of buttons. I've been planning a project for some time in which I encourage the girls to do the tedious sorting out of shank buttons for me, so ideally this will take place after that sorting, as well.

And yet, we do now have numerous ways for the babies to be all buttoned up now:
Which is success any way you look at it.

The Day Camp and the Dremel

The monkeys have been spending their mornings at a little daycamp over at the YMCA this week--a whole morning in the woods with a few very little kids, poking around and singing songs. It's especially fun because it's run by local singer-songwriter Miss Bobbie--Willow told me, "Miss Bobbie plays GUITAR while she sings with us. Have you ever thought about doing that?"

It's awesome and exhausting, just what a daycamp should be. Last night at dinner Willow actually crawled underneath the table and then fell asleep:
That's the picture of a kid who had fun at her morning day camp.

While the girlies have been frolicking away from me, I've been indulging in creating some things with pretty much the only tool that I can't use around them: the Dremel.

Ooh, the Dremel. If you don't have yourself a hand-held multi-purpose rotary tool, I highly recommend getting one. You can drill with this baby, through plastic and entire books. You can cut with it, through wood or glass or tile. You can grind solder or cut glass or ceramics with it.

You really want to do all those things, right? I know!

Anyway, I've been trying to think up some other things to do with my vinyl record stash (Stash-busting is always an approved activity, but I'm also hoping to have an exceptionally successful day at the farmer's market craft fair this Saturday--gotta pay for day camp, don't you know). Two guesses to figure out why I would do this to a vinyl record album:
Clue: I've also checked out several knot-tying books from the library.

Grandpa Bangle's Toolbox

Seriously, I am still working on stuff. 

Yesterday I finished one awesome idea for my Christmas in July Stashbuster Swap family, and now I'm thinking through another, and I sewed not one, but two felt plates for the kids' play food stash, and today I've been cutting out some felted wool dolls, so simple that I'm conflicted about whether or not I even want to sew button eyes and bead smiles on them. I like really, really simple toys, really plain with really basic forms--as Anne would say, there's so much more scope for imagination that way. And I'm still working on plans for our California trip next week (Hello, San Andreas Fault!) and the kids' birthday party this Saturday (Hello, margaritas both virgin and not!). But in the midst of my busy life, I completely forgot to acknowledge a terrific gift I received several weeks ago.

Matt's last grandpa, Grandpa Bangle, died around Christmastime--he was an awesome guy, just as hopeless as me at Trivial Pursuit, kept trying to escape and give me "privacy" whenever I'd start to breastfeed (I've breastfed at the Louvre, so I'm certainly not squeamish about doing it at the breakfast table), totally sweet not just in that way that all old men end up sweet when their testosterone runs out, but sweet like you knew he'd been a gentle spirit his whole life. 

He was a crafty guy, too--we have a set of wooden reindeer that he made for us not long after Matt and I married. Actually, um, I keep them out all the time, on account of they're cool. 

Grandpa was apparently also into some jewelry-making, setting stones and such, because Grandma Bangle recently sent me Grandpa Bangle's old jewelry-making toolbox.

I cannot even tell you the awesomeness of such a gift. It was a combination of getting to feel nostalgic about Grandpa Bangle, finding some truly cool and useful stuff, and poking around in somebody's old cupboard and getting to prowl through all the artifacts. 

Grandma Bangle sent the toolbox off without even peeping into it, so she didn't actually realize that she was committing a felony by US mail, because pretty much the entire top half of this toolbox was full of little packets and bottles and cans of really old volatile chemicals. You know, fluxes and leaded solders and acids and etches--all the good stuff. 

Once that had been disposed of (A good homeschooling project--How does one dispose of dangerous chemicals?) we were left with this:

 

The gift includes a bunch of files, a stand like the one I use to hold my pendants when I solder, a saw, a bunch of hemostats (which I have always wanted!), a bunch of needlenose pliers (including one just like the one I'd just dropped eight bucks on--darn!--but a bunch just like the ones I don't have any money for--score!), and some beautiful polished stones, turquoise and quartz and some marble and I don't know what else, that Will has taken for her collection (she pores over them constantly like Scrooge McDuck--mental note to check out some books on rock identification to get the learnin' in).

We also found this in the toolbox, which Will has also spent many days walking around holding up to her eye:

  

She says, "Mama, it's magic! It makes things look bigger!" 

Science IS magic!

The best part of the gift, though, was folded up in the very bottom of the toolbox. Look, it's Grandpa Bangle's apron:

And now Matt wears it when he putters around the house, too. Thanks, Grandma Bangle.

Beady Photos on Etsy

My favorite part of selling on etsy is taking the photos of my stuff. Just to be braggy, here are the photos from the first set of beads I unstrung, cleaned, and am helping into a bigger, better life:

Such bright, happy beads from such an ugly necklace. Wish them well, these beads, that they find the urban chic or boho or contemporary casual jewelry item they've just been dreaming of belonging to.

Garage Sale Beads

On Saturday, as soon as Kid #2 wakes up (whining for nursie, if she's younger, or just stumbling around groggily, if she's older) and joins Kid #1 (already nursing, if she's younger, or still stumbling around groggily, if she's older), I go in and beat my partner around the head with pillows until he, too, wakes up and makes me some &^(*@)(# coffee, already. Then, of course, we hit the road with all the other sleep-deprived parents and their bright-eyed little children for a morning of farmer's market, garage sales, and the YMCA.

This Saturday we walked nice and early over to a garage sale just around the corner from our house. Dishes, Christmas stuff, stuffed animals--yawn. And yet...over by the peony bush, all those organizers and plastic containers and toolboxes and baskets all over the table and on the grass around it--I wonder what's in those? VINTAGE JEWELRY, that's what! But how much are they selling it for, you ask? ONE DOLLAR EACH?!!? "Each" including the huge Ziploc bags full of jewelry, as well as individual necklaces and rings and bracelets.

Commence tunnel vision. I systematically worked my way through every single organizer and plastic container and toolbox and basket. Oh, the awesomeness. Gawdy 70s brooches and beaded necklaces in crayon colors. Chunky 80s plastic geometric beaded jewelry. Native-style dyed-wood beaded chokers and stones set in wrapped wire. Neo-Victorian-style ornate metal bracelets. At some point, Matt wandered over and asked if I was almost done. Without looking up, I told him to give me all his money and take the girls for a bike ride. I'm sure he stiffed me, though, because there was a long pause before he handed me all of twenty bucks. How did he know that there was at least eighty bucks worth of jewelry covetousness in my heart?

In the end, I presented the little old lady who said that she used to collect jewelry but then stuck it all in storage for 20 years with exactly twenty items (a couple of them being the previously-mentioned Ziploc bags crammed with stuff) and handed her exactly twenty dollars. The joy, the joy, the joy in my heart cannot be expressed. Seriously, look what I scored:

Out of the 50+ pieces of jewelry I ended up with, 23 are super-tacky-enough and strung with such beautiful beads that I can de-string them and repurpose the beads in my own work and sell them as recycled supplies in my Pumpkin+Bear etsy shop. Look at the awesome wooden beads on this very ugly necklace:

There are also a ton of these 70s-era necklaces with their 70s-color chunky beads. I think these look like Jelly Beans:

These wire-wrapped stone necklaces will be especially cool, I think, unstrung and used a little less, um...exuberantly?

And then there were at least twenty or thirty other pieces that I handed over to the kids for craft projects and dress-up. We already used our newest favorite tool, the hot glue gun, to bling up the shelves over my work desk with some strung-bead swag, and here's what the kids have been doing at least twice a day every day since the garage sale:

Little Xsa-Xsas, aren't they? I like how even the kitty has been bedecked.

And amazingly, even with me being kind of about the butchest girl on the planet, I actually found three pieces of jewelry to make my own heart go pitter-pat--a brass chain to wear around my neck, a string of 70s orange beads, and this:

  

For one dollar! That there is the stuff that legends are made of.

The sweetest finds, though, were a couple of pieces of genuine jewelry for the kids. Just look:

The little one has the chunky, shiny, marbled beads, and the big one--can you see what I found for the big one? Yep, a delicate silver necklace, just her size, and the pendant is a W. Its whole life, that pendant has just waited for this moment, because it's finally where it was meant to be--nice when you can make destiny happen for only one dollar.

Remaking Vintage Jewelry

I solder myself and the girls a lot of butch jewelry out of microscope glass and postage stamps, but I haven't yet gotten into beadwork. I read how-to books and arts and crafts books regardless of whether or not I practice that particular craft, however, and so I was pleasantly surprised to find, while reading by Lindsay Cain, a short how-to on remaking vintage jewelry. The most I've ever done with this was to replace a set of my Mama's handpainted yellow beads that Papa bought her in Italy during the war with fishing line instead of rotting thread, but the possibilities here seem pretty sweet. I've seen a lot of recycled jewelry on etsy, for instance, that uses other objects--pop tabs, dominoes, paperclips, keys, etc.--to make beautiful jewelry, but I think it's the same ethic as remaking clothing to take tacky jewelry and make it awesome.

Buzz Buzz Designs is one Web shop that does exactly this--the artist's work seems to be specifically informed by the recycling ethic, and utilizes vintage costume jewelry to make fine new things. I'm especially fond of this vintage Lucite sphere on a vintage aluminum chain.

I also like pequitobun's shop on etsy: this artist's stuff is partially vintage and can be pretty punk rock.

Femmegems itself also offers this really cool jewelry makeover service: you can ship your own vintage jewelry to them and they'll remake it for you into something awesome. Awesome.