The first pen was covered in no time at all, using a white clay base with silver leaf. It looked rather good, and I set it aside while I covered the second one.

As I began slicing the translucent canes it occurred to me that I really should make the second one a little different to the first one. With time at a premium ( I really needed to get these pens baked, sanded, buffed, wrapped and ready to post that day) and my base sheet of white clay and silver leaf all ready to receive the translucent slices, I didn’t really want to prepare a brand new base sheet.

Inspiration hit as I sat considering my options. I spotted a mini-grater sitting minding its own business. Not for long! I picked it up, grabbed a piece of unconditioned blue Modelene and grated some over the prepared sheet.

As luck would have it, I had several bits of primary coloured clay lying around my workspace, plus some green, so I grated some of each over the surface, then rolled the whole mess through the pasta machine.

Since this base sheet had already been rolled to crack the silver leaf surface, when I rolled it at #4 again, the original silver foil effect was lost. When the grated surface was rolled through the pasta machine it turned the ‘grated bits’ into streaks, some of which blended with whatever colour was near, and some of which stayed pure colour.

As you can see in the picture below, the difference was quite amazing, and each pen looks totally different, despite the fact the canes I used were the same for both. As an added bonus, this meant I was also able to send my not-so-flamboyant aunt the paler, less obvious pen, and my more colourful aunt, the pen that was more suited to her personality!

Oh, by the way, my aunts loved their pens!