Cauldron Place Card Holders

These little cauldron place card holders are a fun Halloween decoration for spooky dinner parties. They are made from polymer clay and can be customized with different colors or patterns of potion. The cauldrons themselves can be made from a variety of metallic colors to match your theme.

Step 1: Supplies

To make each place card holder, you'll need:

Aluminum foil (about 4" off a standard roll)
Stiff wire -- I used 10 gauge copper wire but you can use floral stems or other wire
Needlenose Pliers
Wire Cutters
Polymer Clay in the color of your choice to be the "potion" -- about 1/8th of a 2oz block
Black Polymer Clay -- about 1/4th of a 2oz block
A thin pointy object such as the pointed end of a small craft paint brush or the point of a chopstick
A thin, smooth rod, such as a screwdriver, to wrap the wire around when creating your card holding loop

Step 2: The Core and the Wire

First, make a foil core. It's possible to use polymer clay to serve as the core but I didn't want to waste clay. Create the core by simply wadding up your foil into a ball. Don't press it too tightly. You want the ball to be about 1.25" across. Then press the ball down on two sides to create a flattened disk. The disk should be about 1/2" thick. Poke a hole in the center of your disk. You can use the end of your wire to do this but I used a toothpick.

Cut a 6" length of wire. Using pliers, make a rough loop in one end and then bend the wire at a 90 degree angle to the loop. This way, when the loop is laying flat on a surface, the wire is sticking straight up in the air.

Pull the straight length of wire through the hole so the loop acts as a stopper at the other end.

Step 3: Potion

Roll your colored clay, about 1/8th of a 2 oz block of clay, into a ball. Flatten it until it is about the diameter of your foil disk. Pierce through the center of this clay with the end of the wire and pull the disk down over the foil. Smooth the edges of the clay down over the sides of the foil.

Bake this at the temperature and time specified by your brand of polymer clay, in a glass baking pan. I line the bottom of my baking pan with paper.

This potion layer can be varied many ways. I've swirled clay, added glitter, added tiny seed beads to serve as bubbles--it's really open to a lot of variety.

Step 4: Forming the Cauldron

Once this foil and clay core has cooled, it's time to form the cauldron around it. Gather about 1/4th of a 2oz block of clay and roll it in your hands until it's soft and pliable. Pinch off enough to make about a 1/2" ball of clay and set this small amount aside.

Form the larger clump of clay into a ball and flatten it into a disk until it's about twice as wide as the foil disk. Place the foil piece, wire sticking up, in the center of the black clay. Work the black clay up and around the foil piece, as shown. Pull the clay around the sides of the top and smooth the top edge. Then press the clay to taper away from this edge and create the flared top of the cauldron.

Step 5: Embellishing the Cauldron

Divide the rest of the remaining black clay into four equal sections. Set one of these tiny piece aside. Roll each of the other three sections into a ball. Place the balls on the bottom of the cauldron, evenly spaced, to serve as legs. Then press the cauldron down, pushing in on the already hardened colored "potion" in the center of the cauldron, until it's level and the legs are pressed on well.

To create the handles on the sides, divide the remaining clay in two. Roll each section into a ball and flatten slightly. Press the end of a paintbrush or chopsitck into the the center of one disk and then, keeping the point in the clay, place it against the side of the cauldron and press the point in slightly to secure the handles. Pull away the point. Repeat to create a handle for the other side.

Step 6: Looping the Loop

To create the loop that will hold the card label, I suggest that you practice on some plain wire first. You might even consider making the loop earlier in the process, when you can still replace it if the loops don't turn out well.

Bend around 2" of the end of the wire over at a 90 degree angle. Then wrapped the folded-over end around a screwdriver to make it nice and round and tight. The last part is the hardest to wrap but I found it simpler to simply trim the wire down so that I had two full and one partial loop. The card can be inserted between the first and second loops.