A HEART OF GOLD: DIY GILDED RING DISH

So I’m not gonna lie; I hated this project.  It’s not the actual dish that I hate, because I actually love it.  It was the process of trying to mold the clay into a stupid heart.  I could not, for the life of me, do it.  Every time I tried, it looked like something with deformed wings, or a set of lungs.  Not.  Cute.  At first I thought that maybe I had too much clay, so I decided to make two smaller dishes.  That didn’t work.  So then I thought to make four dainty dishes instead.  I still ended up with four deformed wings.  I even made myself a “stencil” out of paper so that I could easily mold the clay, but nothing seemed to work.  After a million failed attempts, giving myself carpal tunnel and ruining my manicure, I finally made the damn heart.  Here’s a tip to make your life easier: when you’re warming up the clay with your hands, first roll it into a ball, then flatten the ball with a hard surface until you have a nice, even circle.  Then mold it into the shape of a heart.  If you’re going to give this a try, I hope you have better luck than I did!

Except mine wouldn’t drip because I think my edges weren’t raised enough.  I tried to create the “drip” by hand but it just looked off; so I ended up painting the whole thing gold.  So just do whatever your heart desires (sorry, I had to)   🙂

Let the gilding dry, and you’re done!