the colored door: Gold Sea Urchin

I have been seeing these gold sea urchins all over and I just love them. I looked for a good tutorial and found one over at Craft and Couture.

I started out with clay that you could bake (from Michaels), gold spray paint and BBQ skewers (because I had then on hand). I liked the pointy end of the skewer so I just cut them to size.

1) I cut the clay in half 2) then rolled it into a ball.

With my skewers cut to about 3 1/2 inches 3) I started putting them in first in a straight line 4) then crossing that line. 5) I filled in each section 6) then finished half. I did have to adjust skewers as I went along and try to reshape the clay a little since I would push on one side with my fingers while putting the skewers in on the other side. So mine was not perfectly round when I was done.

When I had all the skewers in I set the oven at the temp on the packaging and baked it for about 2 hours. Some of the skewers got a little brown on the ends but otherwise it looked fine. It was at this point I was pretty sure this craft was going to be a fail. It did not look great. But I decided to go ahead and spray it just to see how it looked, and I am so glad I did. It turned out so much better than I expected. Oh how I love spray paint and it is almost getting to cold to use it anymore :(

It adds so much interest to my book shelf. I really like how this little guy turned out.

And since I had extra clay my 4 year old daughter wanted in on the action. I just love hers! She was so proud. It has a perfect spot on the book shelf too. I think she wanted it in her room but I knew it would just get lost in there so I am glad she let me display it.