Patience is a virtue that I don't have very often

I'm VERY excited about my new vintage ad art pendants. I've posted my vintage ad art on Etsy, and when my pendants are done curing (more on that in a bit), I'll have those up for sale there as well. They'll of course be available at my studio during the Saint Paul Art Crawl, and I've started contacting several retail locations as well!

Now, as far as the curing goes, I wanted to make resin jewelry. I heard that resin was messy, smelly and difficult to use. So instead, I thought I'd go for the "glass-like" glue. Except at about 1/8" thick, it's not so glass-like. It's more like you poured a bunch of watered down Elmer's on your image. Then I read in order for it to work, you have to do it in layers. Put down a bit, wait for it to dry, put down more, wait, lather, rinse, repeat. 

Here's the thing: I hate repetitive multiple steps. I hated putting 2 coats of paint on my walls. It's like, "I did it once, it should be FINISHED." So I knew this multiple coats of glue garbage wouldn't work for me. Plus, I'm selling them. I don't want to sell glue pendants, I want to sell nice looking resin pendants.

So I exchanged the one bottle of glue that I didn't use for a box of resin. I bought all the necessary materials from the dollar store (score!): 2 measuring cups (that now I have to throw away...even at a dollar a piece, that's just wasteful. I tried to clean them, but it just made a big mess), wax paper, toothpicks (for poking at bubbles) and a huge bag of plastic gloves (that will also work with hair dye! yay!!).

So the resin comes in 4 oz bottles, which makes 8 oz. overall. That's a lot of resin for 10 pendants that each only need about 1/8" filled. So I decided I would make 2 oz. It was still WAY more than I needed, but I had no idea. Trial and error. So I got all the pendants ready, laid them out, and started to pour my VERY bubbly resin. Not cool. Naturally, started freaking out. It said that as it starts to set, the bubbles rise to the top. But, to force this, blow a HAIRDRYER on it. Okay.....

So I got out the hairdryer and started passing it over one of the pendants. pop! pop pop pop! All the bubbles started rising to the surface! Who knew? Instructions actually know something. :)

So after futzing with them for way too long, and agonizing over the little imperfections (they're handmade...gotta learn to let it go...), I made a little wax paper tent (to protect them from dog fur and other dust) and will wait for them to set! (24 hours for a soft cure, 72 for a hard cure)

And here are my pendants, waiting for their tent: