Shells, boats and sand casting

We decided to put away the prickly horse chestnut shells, fir cones and seed pods which had made their way onto the dresser. Let's not fast forward into autum, even if the weather is becoming more autumnal by the day! Instead we set up a seaside scene.

Miles helped make a paper sail for his shell boat.

We decided this was a good time to try out the sand casting technique which we discovered at our last art workshop. We half filled a take away type carton with damp sand and pressed it down smooth.

We pressed shells into it, leaving the imprints behind.

We filled it with modelling plaster and left it to set for a few hours before carefully turning it out and washing away the surplus sand. The final results have not photographed well. In reality they are gorgeous and much more defined than the picture would have you think.

I guess we could do this with fir cones, seed pods etc in autumn. Perhaps we could even do one with tools for daddy. I think drill bits and spanners could work well.