Piggy Clay Charms

A warm greeting from the beautiful island of Penang, Malaysia!!! Today, I have a clay craft to share with you. These cute little clay piggy charms are made from extra-lightweight air-dry clay. Due to its lightweight and perfect size (1″), the clay charms are suitable to make into a keychain.

Air-dry-able is great because you can do it yourself without having to invest in heating equipment to cure the clay which usually happens to some clay products.

Playing with clay is easy, you can simply remold it or reshape it if you are not completely satisfied with the outcome. This clay piggy charm was inspired by the piggy bun amigurumi pattern I’ve shared 2 years ago. If you like piggy items, besides Piggy Clay Charms and Piggy Bun Amigurumi, you may like to look on crochet Piggy Amigurumi and  Piggy Pillow Sewing Pattern, not forgetting the Easy Sock Pig which I have published in 2019.

If you prefer a bigger charm, you can always make it into other sizes. This clay piggy charm requires extra-light-weight air-dry clay in white, yellow and pink, and 2 nos. of 5mm black beads. You will also need to prepare some simple tools that you will find in your house: a toothpick and a pen cover. Optional items you might need are a key-chain ring and the accessories if you want to make it into the key-ring charm and tacky glue (sometimes white craft glue works too but it has to be the thick type).

As you might know that recently I have just started up an online shop (Craft Passion Shop), life was a bit crazy over the past 2 months with all the setup. After all the dust has settled, I am glad that I have more time sitting in front of my MacBook writing up tutorials from the back-log crafts I have created a while ago. I am pleased that I am back to my routine sharing of free craft tutorials, I hope nothing will stop me or slowing me down from posting my passion here.

The shop is part of the service I wanted to provide to my loyal readers and passionate crafters, it is a rather product support and a channel for you to find the hard to find materials I will occasionally use in my free tutorial. That’s the main reason for setting up of Craft Passion Shop.

Happy crafting and creating!!! I hope you enjoy playing with clay as much as I do.

What’s Next

• Start making and share your completed handmade on Facebook and/or Instagram. Remember to tag us, @craftpassion, so that we are able to see them.
• Pin it to Pinterest for future To-Do List
• Share with your DIY groups for a diy-along event.
• Browse more free craft tutorials to DIY, especially our clay crafts.

Piggy Clay Charms

Materials and Tools:
1. Extra lightweight air-dry clay, white (about 1″ ball), pink, yellow
2. Black beads, 5mm, 2 pcs.
3. Small jingle bell
4. Eye pin, key-chain ring, and jewelry pliers (if you want to make it as a key-chain charm)
5. Toothpick
6. Pen cover or drinking straw

Note: If your clay doesn’t stick well, you may glue them with PVC craft glue / Mod Podge / Aleene’s Tacky glue

Get ready all the materials and tools as listed above.
Since the clay is an air-drying type, keep them in sealed plastic bags or containers. You may also wrap them in cling film too.
Knead the clay to soften and smoothen the texture if needed.

Roll the white clay to about 1″ ball.
Eyeballing the quantity of yellow and pink clay as shown in the picture. You just need tiny bits of them. The yellow clay is for making ears, pink is for making nose and tail.
Roll 2 small balls of yellow, 1 small oval of pink and 1 stick for the tail (with 1 end rounder and the other end pointier).

Hold the sides of the white clay ball, lightly press in on the table to create a flat bottom so that it sits better on your working table.
Press the clay ball with a toothpick as shown in the picture, to make a vertical indentation for the front.
Repeat again but with slighter force to make the vertical indentation at the back of the clay piggy.

Impress the round eyes next to the vertical indentation by using the pen cover.

Press the 5mm black beads into the round eyes. If the beads don’t stick well into the clay, you may apply a small dot of tacky glue to make it stick better.

Flatten the yellow balls and pink oval with your thumb.

Place the pink nose onto the face of the piggy, lightly press it down with a toothpick.

Pierce the 2 nostrils with a toothpick.

Press the rounded end of the tail onto the vertical indentation at the back of the piggy. Again, if it doesn’t stick well, put a small dot of tacky glue to make it stick well, hold the tail for a moment until it is secured.

Bend the tail to form a twist from top to bottom (as shown in picture).

Pinch the yellow circle clay onto the toothpick (as shown).

This is how the ear looks like before removing the toothpick.

Pierce 2 holes on the head to mark the ear’s positions.

Position one of the ear pieces on the head, press and hold it down until it descends partly into the head. Press the tip of the ear to shape it.
Repeat again to the other ear.
Put a small drop of glue if needed before inserting the ears into the head.

If you want to make the clay piggy charm into key-chain, insert the eye pin from the top of the clay piggy all the way down until the eye touches the head. Insert a jingle bell and bend the straight end at the bottom of the piggy to form another eye of the pin.

Leave the clay piggy charm to dry at room temperature for at least 24 hours. Attach the key-chain ring to complete the clay piggy charm with key-chain.