Friendly Plastic Mold 'n Make

Oh yeah! You are going to LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this one!!! Why? Well.....just read all the way through and you will see!!!

I'm starting out with Friendly plastic pellets. And we'll try to do a video of this one as well, but just so you can get started, here's the instructions:

1. Heat water in an electric skillet at just under 200 degrees. You want to see the steam coming off the water. But not boiling.

2. Drop in pellets and let them melt. It's ok for them to run around. They will be clear, not white, when they are ready. I use a pointy tool and just drag them all together....they will stick to each other. Pick them up out of the water with the pointy stick and put them on a non-stick craft sheet and start working them all together.

Watch Linda Peterson's video here. - just the first part where she shows you how to melt the pellets in the skillet. Well, go ahead, watch the whole video! LOLOL!!!

3. You don't need to color the pellets at all and you don't need the strip that she shows. But you can see the pointy stick I'm talking about. When she takes it out of the water....that's where my instructions continue:

4. You want to roll this into a ball. How big? How many pellets? Approximately twice the size of the item you want to make a mold of.

Here's the metal charm that I wanted to make a mold of.  Pretty large.  Took about 1/4 c of pellets.  Place the mold face up on a non-stick craft sheet.  Always cover your piece in olive oil, baby oil, badger balm, mold release.....something so that the item will release itself after the pellets set up.

5. Place the pellet ball on top of the mold and spread out over the entire mold.   Your ball will still be clear at this point.  If it has started to turn white, just place it back in the water until it turns clear again.  Once you have it shaped over the piece, place it all (including the craft sheet) down into cold water.  It will turn back white.  At that point, you simply pull the mold away from the piece.  


6.  You can use any medium in this that is not hot.  So, you can't pour UTEE in this, or place hot friendly plastic in here as it will melt the mold and stick to it.  But, you can use polymer clay, metal clay, air dry clay, paper mache, anything like that.  I've used air dry clay here.

7.  When the clay is dry, just pop it out.  Note:  the mold is very hard.  It is not flexible at all.  I use my little pointy pick to get the clay started out of the mold.

8.  Very little, if any, shrink factor in this process.

9.  The reason why I LOVE Friendly plastic pellets for mold making.....when you are done with the mold, you simply drop it back into the hot water, wait until it goes clear, then reuse it all over again.  Just think about it....you can use the same piece to make mold after mold after mold!  How cool is that????