Done!: Shrinky Dink Jewelry

My latest pinterest project was shrinky jewelry.
Here's the original pin which takes you to the Rust and Sunshine blog.  Looks like she followed this instructable.

Source: rustsunshine.blogspot.com via Manda on Pinterest

The idea is, you collect #6 plastic that you would normally throw in the recycling bin, have the kids draw on it with permanent marker, and then shrink it in the oven like a Shrinky Dink!  I love the idea of wearing some of their art and Shrinky Dinks are awesome, so really, there was no way I wasn't doing this.

In Rust and Sunshine's post she made a bracelet and had a piece leftover that she made a necklace out of.  I'm not really a bracelet person and since we were making these for Grandmas that weren't readily available for sizing we decided to do necklaces instead.

Most of the plastic came from fast food take out containers.  I thought we would hit the jack pot with bakery containers but they all seemed to be #1 plastic. So I've been saving for a long time.   First I cut them into big flat pieces so the kids could color on them.

 

 

Kaida did most of the heavy lifting in the coloring department.  But I made sure that Colin colored at least a little on each piece.  That was a challenge though, since, when you hand him a marker he immediately flips it over and tries to color with the wrong end.  I was going to take pictures of them coloring and include them with the necklace as a certificate of authenticity.  But I value my dining room table, chair covers, walls, linoleum, and cats too much to let my guard down for that.

 

Once they were done coloring I cut out the shapes, wrote their names and the year on them, and punched a hole for the jump ring. 

 

 

 

Then I put them in the oven at 250 degrees for a couple minutes (Rust and Sunshine says 350 but the instructable she links to said both 250 and 225 in separate tutorials).  They curled and flattened a bunch of times and once they seemed to stay flat I took them out.  A bunch of them were sort of wavy so I needed to flatten them again with the bottom of a heavy glass, I just smushed them flat for a couple seconds.

 

 

 

 

It's kind of hard to tell how much they shrank by but I would say it was at least half.  There were some made out of a different, blue, #6 plastic that shrank a lot more.  It also turned nearly opaque  and you can't see their coloring unless you hold it up to the light.  So it's a bit of trial and error with some wishing and hoping.

 



I bought some jump rings and plain necklaces at Michael's and this is the final product.  We sent one to Grandmom and one to Grammy and I've worn mine almost every day.  I like it best with a plain light colored shirt or something cut a little lower so it has a plain background to display my little artists' work.