The Good, The Bad, and the Ugh-ly

My morning yesterday was busy, fun and productive. I spent it drawing, tracing and cutting out shapes from fun foam and adhering them to pieces of cardboard to make my own stamps. A bit limited, but fun nonetheless.



I probably should have stamped them with black on white paper, but I think you can see them well enough. To get the bits of detail in some of them, I simply marked them with a pencil with a bit of pressure to leave an impression in the foam.


I had an appointment with my Algebra tutee at 3 pm at Panera's, so left a bit early to make a trip to the library and then stop at the recycle center with newspaper, plastic and styrofoam. I still had a bit of time so I ran into Target to buy a small chain to wear one of my pendants. A side note: I always say that I am not "into" jewelry. I had totally forgotten why that is - After wearing the small chain for only about 1/2 an hour, the back of my neck began to burn. By the time I got that necklace off, I had a long red painful area where the chain had come into contact with my skin. That is why I am not "into" jewelry. And that brought back all the reasons why I had my ears pierced twice before finally letting them grow back forever. Even when I bought the most expensive "hypoallergenic" kinds of metals, my ears continued to "ooze". I am obviously overly sensitive - or at least my skin is!

When I got home I couldn't wait to try out the Melting Pot. I read all the instructions carefully and plugged it in, turned it on and added a large amount of UTEE. I covered it and waited for the orange light to go out. When the orange light went out signaling that the UTEE was ready to be used, I took off the cover. Imagine my surprise when I found that there were three distinct layers in the pot. The lower layer was liquid. The middle layer was like an ice floe - solid. The upper layer had bits of powder on it. Thinking that it was me and not the appliance, I moved the mess around a bit with the Kool Tool and recovered it and waited. Finally it appeared (with much coaxing) that it had indeed melted. But alas!

This is what I have to show for my efforts. The rectangular and roundish parts are the result of dipping some of my pendants into the "melted" UTEE. Each and every one of them hardened around the object and then promptly separated. The big blob in the lower right corner is the UTEE I emptied out of the container when I was thoroughly disgusted and ready to stop playing. It really is that sort of amber color that you can get if you want by overcooking the UTEE. Mine didn't cook enough, but still that color! Go figure!

I am taking the Melting Pot back to Michael's and getting store credit so that I can buy something else. This experience was too exasperating, too messy and too ugh for me to want to try it all over again. For now I will be happy using an embossing pad and using the UTEE in solid form with my heat gun to get any lovely shine on things.

I am going to Michael's when they open and I will post my alternate purchases when I return.

Bye for now!