I first tried out the Pinterest favourite of decorating plain ceramics with a sharpie pen (permanent marker) at Christmas when I made mugs to fill with truffles made by the twins to give to family. In the festive craziness I completely ran out of time to blog the results so I’ve been patiently waiting for Valentines day to come around so I can try again.
The process is really simple – take a plain ceramic piece of crockery such as a mug, plate or bowl, draw your design onto the surface with a Sharpie (I’ve got a rainbow of different colours in my craft kit), and then bake in the oven at 150 degrees Celsius for 30 minutes. Turn off the oven and leave the piece to cool in there before getting it out.
Top tips? If you make a mistake at the drawing stage, don’t panic – you can rub off your mistake with a baby wipe or cloth and they redraw it. I personally don’t have the patience, but you could always draw on your design first with a chinograph pencil and then go over it with the pen when you’ve got it perfect. Finally, I recommend washing the finished piece by hand rather than in the dishwasher or you’ll see your design magically disappear!
To give mine as a gift I filled the mugs with peppermint creams (made by the twins), wrapped it in cellophane and used my new Dymo labelmaker with neon tape (one of my best Christmas presents this year) to add a Valentines message.
