Tuesday’s Tip! – Using very old Fimo!

A little while back I needed to make some penguins for a box card. Thats OK you think, yes but not when its the middle of the night (literally) and you don’t really have anything that even resembles a penguin!

But then I remembered some time, many, many years ago I had purchased a Santa Claus Fimo set! I knew it had black in there, but where it was, was another question! It could of been buried any where in my pit of a workshop.

So after much hunting, I finally found it! A tub with some Fimo, the Santa bits and some random ones, some were still in sealed packs, some not. But I wasn’t holding out much hope bearing in mind these had been ‘stored’ for about 10years!

I got out the black and broke off a small piece. I started kneeding it, It crumbled everywhere! I honestly thought it must’ve spoiled (not that I would be surprised after about 10years lol) It seemed hopeless, so I began a frantic search on the internet of anyway to save my crumbling Fimo. I didn’t have time to go to the shop in the morning, this needed to be done and in the post by then!

The gist I got from most things I read, was Fimo doesn’t go off. It doesn’t even need to be stored in an air tight container, after all its not air dry, but bake to set…So basically as long as its not been stored in direct sunlight and not somewhere where its got really hot, then it should be useable.

So I went back to my very crumbly Fimo and started trying to squish (yes very technical) a few smaller bits together and just persisted with the kneeding, collecting the crumbled bits back into the section I was kneeding every time they came away. With dexterity issues in your hands (like I have) this can make them ache quite a bit, so the smaller the chunks you are kneeding the better, I also found adding a little heat helped to soften it slightly. I’m sure newer Fimo wouldn’t be quite as bad, but don’t forget this was very very old lol.

It took quite some time but i kept persisting and finally it started to feel and look like what you would expect a fresh new piece of Fimo to look like. And I managed to do the same with some yellow and white and these cute little guys were made 🙂

So todays tips are as follows:

1. If you have old Polymer clay, that has been stored out of sunlight and not somewhere that gets really hot, even if its extremely old, don’t bin it. Kneeding it a bit more than normal will help to bring it back to life.
2. Heat helps to soften it (not too much that you draw any final moisture out though!)
3. You can add a little mineral oil (or baby oil if you don’t have mineral oil) to the clay and kneed it in, this will also help soften it.

Here are two of the little penguins on their snowy new home!

I hope you will pop back again soon for my next post, please feel free to sign up for the newsletter using the box in the side bar or by entering your email address below, that way you won’t miss out on any hints, tips or Freebies too 🙂

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