One Skull - Two Ways - Gothic/Day of the Dead Keychain

Today on the Makin's Clay® blog I'm sharing instructions on how to create this Gothic Skull/Day of the Dead Keychain with Makin's Clay® and DecoArt® products - whether you like it plain and creepy, or colorful and ready to celebrate - it's a super easy project that would make a fun pendant too.  Just in time for Halloween!

Vampire Blood/Faux Blood Necklace

My favorite season is here and I can't help myself - I just have to re-share some of my favorite spooky fun projects!  In this episode of my series Behind These Eyes™ on When Creativity Knocks, I share my recipe for creating faux blood using ICE Resin & Rit Dye! 

And to further add to the creep factor - here's my recipe for the GHOULISH version of faux blood!  

The Truly GHOULISH Option of Faux Blood

In the Vampire Blood Necklace episode of Behind These Eyes with Cindi Bisson, I share my recipe for faux blood that will last for years. As part of the instructions, I suggest you use a tiny bit of Rit Liquid Dye at a time to color the resin - because if too much dye is used, you get a different result. We didn’t share that result in the episode - but I wanted to show our viewers just what kind of ghoulish results you get with extra dye! It’s a creepy effect too which would work great for some applications - just not for the pendant I was sharing with you. So without further ado…add a teaspoon or more of Rit Liquid Dye (the amount depends on just how crusty you want the finished result to be) to your small amount of mixed ICE Resin and you get what I think looks like clotty, crusty, totally disgusting blood puddles! Which my two boys think are totally cool…Happy Halloween!  

Follow the original instructions and you get smooth, dense puddles of faux blood.

Alter the recipe as above and you get GHOULISH blood!

Sullivans USA Gothic Goes Girly Macrame Bracelet

What does a Halloween obsessed designer think of first when she receives with a package of two lovely shades of pink Hebe Cord from Sullivans USA?  Why, SKULLS of course!  The result is this Gothic Goes Girly Skull bracelet.   Thinking back over my crafty past, I don't ever remember attempting to macrame - but after searching the web for easy to follow instructions I found great site that was able to walk me through creating this piece.  I went back to school at www.MacrameSchool.com!    Here's the link to the video tutorial that will walk you through the easy to follow instructions for what they call a "cool wave" or "snake" style bracelet. This project is part of a special Designer Craft Connection blog hop - Be sure to click the Designer Craft Connection button in the right column to see what the other participating Designer Craft Connection designers have done with their Sullivans USA Hebe Cord!

http://www.macrameschool.com/resources/bracelets/222-easy-wave-snake

Materials: 

Sullivans USA Hebe Cord - Two shades of pink
The Beadery pink skull beads - 10
Westcott Craft Titanium Bonded Non-Stick Scissors & Ruler
Needle
Duck Brand Tape (optional - but sure made it easier!)

I'm including a few photos to give you a close up of the steps in the video.  It took me a couple of tries, but once I got rolling, it was quite simple to do!

ICE Resin Layered Swirl Gothic Pendant

I've been having more creative fun with my ICE Resin and EarthSafe Finishes.  This time I've created a gothic style pendant for ICE Resin's Technique Tuesday series.  View the latest edition of Creatively Crafty with Cindi Bisson to find out how to recreate this technique at the ICE Resin blog.