Community Feature: P's and Q's Creative Design, Creating Polymer Clay Earrings

It was a blustery winter day in February when I first met Kelsey….cheerful, colorful earring sets peppered the table and displays around her. She graciously accepted my invite to be one of our community creators featured here on the SteadGoods blog, so we arranged a call one week later on Valentine’s Day.

SteadGoods: “To start us off, why don’t we pretend that I know nothing about you and what you create. Tell me who you are, what your medium of choice is, and how long you have been a maker.”

Kelsey: “Sure! So my name is Kelsey Raschke. I live and work in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and I create polymer clay jewelry. Its a clay that you cure at specific temps in the oven. It turns into a plastic essentially, which I do struggle with sometimes because of the ecological aspect. But, you can endlessly bake it, so in that way, there is no waste. If a piece turns out badly, I can add to it and remake it the way I want it to be.

As far as creating goes, I have been creating all of my life. I was really blessed to have grandparents that lived in Door County Sister Bay area while I was growing up. Every summer my parents would drop us off for weekends with my Grandma, and she was an incredibly creative person. She quilts; she uses mixed media. Because of her, I would say I have always been creating. She’s 92 and I am very lucky to still have her. The joke is that I am her favorite grandchild because I actually have a tattoo of her handwriting on me.

I also spent 7 years as an art teacher, and also went to art school. I left teaching and became an educator at a local museum, but I missed having the opportunity to be creating daily – to have your hands in the art supplies. I think me missing that part of my prior job is what eventually transformed into my business: ‘P’s and Q’s Creative Design’.”

SteadGoods: “What would you say originally inspired your creative journey? And how do you continue to find the inspiration and motivation today?”

Kelsey: “So, I didn’t plan to create a business at all. *laughs* I’ve been formally doing P’s and Q’s since March of 2022, but I never saw something like this in my future at all. I’m not the kind of high achiever or goal setter who would plan for it. I think I realized that I wanted to create things, but then I didn’t know what to do with them. I realized I should probably sell the pieces...but I didn’t know if people would want to buy them?? And then it sort of like, spiraled from there!

I was reflecting on why I started my business and where I find inspiration, and I realized I just kind of had the energy to do it and found joy in it. I work part time, my husband and I chose to be child free, and I get so inspired creating and watching other people create. I intentionally keep my Instagram feed flooded with other creators, and its amazing to me how two artists using the exact same mediums can create completely different types of art from them. Three of us can be at a market selling earrings from polymer clay, and all of our stuff will be completely different. That’s so cool to me. I make rainbows and cats and dogs and stuff I want to wear. Other people go a totally different direction, but ultimately, its all about finding joy in the art.”

SteadGoods: “I can see that you primarily make jewelry, but do you or have you made other types of goods or created other forms of art?”

Kelsey: “I was a big Cricut person...still do sometimes. I make dish towels and things. I also love using Scrabble letters – I make coasters and magnets and everything from them. They all have a similar energy to my earrings: joyful, a little kitschy, a little feminist, lots of puns. Those earlier works gave me the confidence to try out and embrace the earring side of the business.

I feel like those early works and crafting also helped me get past some of the stigma of being an elementary art teacher, ya know? Like, all I did was color with crayons and finger paint all day…those types of misconceptions. People being interested in my Cricut and my scrabble projects really pushed me to try and elevate my work and and my art into the polymer clay direction. Which is now my primary activity when it comes to creating.”

SteadGoods: “Can you walk me through the process of creating your earrings with polymer clay?”

Kelsey: “Well, it always starts with impostor syndrome. Every time, I find myself frozen and wondering if I have forgotten everything I have ever learned. *laughter* So I talk myself up a little and have to make myself sit down to do it.

You don’t need a lot of space for polymer clay, just a table and some good storage. The clay comes in bricks – generally a few ounces at a time – and you have to work it initially to soften it. One of the tricks in the polymer clay business is utilizing a pasta machine to blend and work the clay to get it ready to mold. Some colors are harder or softer, the age of the clay influences texture too.

Once the clay is workable, there are little cutters and embossers to work with. I probably have hundreds of them, some really simple, some complex. You need really good lighting and you have to do all the prep of the different clay colors first. Then you start cutting various shapes. Depending on the complexity of the design you may be layering and spacing a lot of bits of clay. You may have to work with 2 colors, or 10 at a time.
I very seldom use any of the colors straight…polymer clay allows for a lot of color mixing. You can make them more of less intense, blend colors, marble them, ect.

I get the question all the time about how long the pieces take. Some simple pairs can take a couple of minutes each set, other pairs take 20+ minutes just to cut and put together. That is before baking, sanding, drilling holes and adding the earring hardware. I do my baking in a toaster oven so I have better control of the temperatures. Polymer clay can be brittle, or burn if the temperatures aren’t exact. For the sanding, artists use anything from acetone to hand sanding and exacto knives. I use a Dremel.

Oftentimes I work in batches that will utilize the same colors. I may do 100 to 150 Valentine’s earrings for instance...most of them using colors like white and red and pink. But I may make 5 of a more complex Valentines design, and then use the same clay colors or excess from the first set to make a batch of 15 or 20 of a simpler design that is along the same theme. I do huge batches for certain seasons too – people love fall craft shows, and I make tons of fall themed earrings.”

SteadGoods: “Switching gears a little bit, what do you find most challenging about balancing your craft with the demands of the rest of normal life?”

Kelsey: “Depending on the time of the year, I really don’t do a good job balancing them. That is a point of contention in my household, the amount of time I spend in my studio. During certain times of the year, I tend to overload myself with markets, and I will get worried about having enough stuff to sell, so I just keep creating.

I used to do more of the ‘other’ things – the Cricut projects and scrabble projects – but then I started giving myself permission to focus on what brought the most joy, which is the earrings. I think if you can give yourself permission to focus on your favorite thing, that is a good tip. I also give myself most of the month of January off. I don’t touch clay during that time. I may pick up some creating at the end of the month to prep for the Valentines markets in February, but otherwise January is my vacation time.

The only downside is the impostor syndrome is way way worse when you sit back down to start creating again!”

SteadGoods: “Your January vacation time is such a smart hack, especially after all those holiday markets! Do you have any favorite stories from your time taking your earrings to market? Customer stories or anything?”

Kelsey: “You know, I was not expecting just how many friends I would make doing markets. I interact with other creators who become familiar faces at the markets, or even become close friends. One girl became so close I was invited to her wedding!

I love the sense of community. Everyone is generally supportive. I also didn’t expect to have ‘regulars’ that would come out for my stuff, but I do. People come out looking for new pieces from this season’s collection, and they tell me they came to the market just because I was going to be there. When I hear stuff like that it really catches me off guard.

I sell about one thousand pairs of earrings a year – which is insane. That’s a lot. I think about how there are 1,000 people in our area walking around wearing my earrings and its mind blowing. I’ve only seen someone in public wearing them once, and they wore them on purpose because they knew where my day job was. But I’m waiting for the day I see someone randomly in the grocery store – when I get to see them 'organically' if you will.

This past holiday season, I created a mismatched pair of gingerbread earrings...a happy one, and one with a sad face. The sad face gingerbread man had his foot bitten off. At every single market, a sweet older woman would gently inform me that one of my pairs was broken. They were so careful and concerned that I not be embarrassed by it. And then I would point out the gingerbread man faces and they would suddenly realize it was intentional and their mood would change so quick. It happened every single market – it was my favorite thing.”

SteadGoods: “Before we finish up here, where can people interested in your work or your story find you?”

Kelsey: “I post on Instagram and Facebook. My Instagram has a lot of information on my process and time-lapses and stuff...which may be particularly interesting to some. I have a website and mailing list as well where you can find online ordering and the markets I will be attending. My business name is ‘P’s and Q’s Creative Design’, named after my cat ‘Puss’ and my dog ‘Quinn’. Both rescues. My pit bull mix Quinn recently celebrated her ‘100 Dog Years’ birthday. I’m very millennial about those things!”

SteadGoods: “I had a great time chatting, thanks for participating Kelsey!”

Kelsey: “Absolutely, and Happy Valentine’s Day!”

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