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[obscure-abyss.livejournal.com]

Hey there!

Sometime before last Christmas I bought a bunch of Sculpey, with my only experience with clay being in a ceramics class. Not quite the same thing (of course I knew that when I bought them.) I made a few cute things that were Christmas themed and now I want to branch out. However, I don't have a good work space. All I have is the kitchen table, which works ok, but it's not perfectly smooth and up until now I've just been laying newspaper down. Which I'm sure you know, clay picks up the newsprint.

So all of that useless backround info was to ask the following question: What can I buy (preferably cheap) to protect the table and the clay?
Also, is there anything you use in particular to get the clay off of your hands when you are done with one color? No matter what I always end up getting a bit of color mixed in with the white and lighter color clays.

Thanks! And sorry for a lack of pictures!

ETA: I was thinking about adding some glitter to the clay. Can I bake it without the glitter burning? Or should I just wait until I glaze the piece and mix the glitter into the glaze?