I got one of these off ebay, and hubby cut and smoothed a thin piece of wood the exact width to avoid the sideways wiggling. I really must play with it! Thanks for the reminder, Valerie!

Absolutely kicking myself! A few months ago I threw out the mitre box I'd bought about 20 years ago but used only once. Will now invest in another as thin, even slices are the holy grail of polymer clay. I reckon glueing a buffer made of baked scrap clay to an old ruler would replace the Thumb Trick, and a couple of rings cut from the necks of balloons might stretch around the ends of the ruler to make it non-slip.

What a great idea! Jane is a marvel. My canes are not quite good enough to bother slicing yet, but when they are, I thank you both profoundly for both coming up with and demonstrating the concept. Cheers! x

I upgraded to a metal mitrebox a few weeks ago but kept my old platic one. Now I know what to do with it! As other have suggested I will probably tweek the concept a bit now that I have been given the general idea. Thank you both for sharing the idea!

Always looking for less expensive options , thanks for sharing !

Very helpful tip. Thank you to Jane and you (and Ginger of Blue Bottle Tree of course.)

Thank you for sharing this! It's brilliant!

I’m rubbish at cutting canes and this is an ingenious idea. Thank you for sharing.

Great idea and great to hear you again 😀

Thanks Val! Perhaps you could use double sided tape under your ruler to hold it in place or maybe cut a piece off of a rubber rug mat! Where there’s a will, there’s a way!! ❤️😜

Awesome! I rather like using common and inexpensive tools. Will share on my blog!

Cool, I actually had this idea a while ago. I have a miter box to cut soap and figured it would be a great hack for cutting polymer clay canes. Thanks for sharing

So nice! I think I have seen those at the dollar store in spring time. Thank you for the tutorial.

I love this idea! I have a wooden one but will look for a little plastic one. I'll try to figure out a way to slid the clay through a bit easier. I'm a crafty person and always fiddle with things so this should be fun! thank you for showing us this.

Genius idea!!! Just ordered mitre box off of ebay...no cane slicing until it arrives!! Thank you, and Jane!

I neglected to say 'thx for the tutorial Val!!'. Watching your videos = always enjoyable experiences! I imagine listening to you read recipes would be fun, your personality seems to make everything enjoyable. I do wish you had been here during my recent move, your high entertainment value would have been most welcome.

I want a cane slicer but I don’t do a lot of canes so I don’t want to spend a lot 😏. This is a very clever idea, but I am extraordinarily clumsy and would soon forget which bits were polymer clay and which bits were fingers. I Googled slicers and looked at the images and came across something called a soap slicer - lots of variations and some seem small enough, adjustable enough and cheap enough to fit the bill. They are mainly made of wood but there are some stainless steel ones. I’m going to do a bit more research before I buy 🤔, but I think it will be good enough for my needs.

Thank you for sharing this!

Great idea! Thanks for sharing this! I was seriously thinking about purchasing the LC Slicer within the next month or so, but I’m definitely putting that purchase on hold after seeing this. There are other smaller and cheaper cane slicers out there, but I really think the best way to slice a cane is with the blade horizontal and not many of the smaller cane slicers cut this way...at least the ones I’ve seen.

Thanks for the great idea😎🤙

Thank you!!! Great idea!

Thank you so much for these thrifty ideas. I am new to poly and am sorry to see how much I have to buy just to be an amateur. :) You might find that a metal ruler with a cork back would work well.

Thank you so much for sharing this, I only wish that I had known about it be for I lashed out £100 on a Lucy Clay mini slicer (which just sits on a shelf because I didn't find it very useful at all, I was so disappointed in this product). I find your channel incredibly useful and you are an absolute delight to watch (the videos that feature your son are so funny) thanks again for the info and I look forward to your next video.

Cut a piece of shelf liner to go into the bottom of the box to prevent ruler from slipping. Great idea thanks for sharing!

Thank You ! It is great idea .I suck first cane making and second I suck trying to cut straight anything and everything .I have steel ruler ,blade and now to hunt for mini miter box :)

That’s cool!

You got me to thinking after watching your video. I just bought a 4 x 12" rectangular quilting ruler because I couldn't find mine then of course remembered where I'd put it as soon as I got home. I've had acrylic cut at Lowes ( like Home Depot) in the past and am going to have then cut this into pieces for me to make a slicer. 1 4x4 piece and 4 2x4 pieces. I think I can just use my glue gun or maybe gorilla glue to glue them together. 1 each of the 2" pieces in a line with a small opening between on each side.. glued to the 4x4' base. And it already has printed on guide lines! How can that not work? I got my quilting ruler at Joann's and used a half price coupon. I think in total it cost me about $6 usd. Lowe's will charge $1. per cut.. so 3 cuts @ $1.00 each - $3.00. In total this will cost less than $10. usd. I already have a cork backed metal ruler to set my clay on, if I need it. If there were a bigger word than excited I'd use it. Thanks so much for the idea & getting me thinking about this!

Might be worth getting a cork backed metal ruler to reduce the slip. awesome idea to use the miter box though!

I'm sure I've seen one of these mitre thingies in the garage. Will I ever find it, now I have a use for it?!

I found a mini miter box exactly like yours on Amazon.ca for CAD$10.39 There is also an aluminum one by Revell available at Michaels, not sure what they cost. On Ebay they were selling for about $12, but with another $12 in shipping cost.

Great idea! American hardware stores have full size mitre boxes for $10-15. I've also seen an extra tiny metal one (Xacto brand) at craft stores. I wonder if you could use magnet strips to keep it in place?

Thank you! I now have an additional use for my miter box which gets very little use. I'm thinking try a piece of wood or other heavy item behind the cane. I'm going to try to get a piece of the foam board, which a local store occasionally has in stock. Very cool!

to stop the block from moving, a cheap silicone trivet placed under would work, or a damp thin sponge/ or piece of towel. To stop the ruler from moving and the cane from pushing back, looping a couple of rubber bands on it (behind the clay should help. Even a few tiny pieces of clay itself, softened, would stop it moving. a marble sized scrap of clay pressed behind the cane would stop it moving back and free up your hands

Oh my goodness....YOU ARE MY HERO!!! I am brand, brand new at everything having to do with polymer clay and this is just one more tutorial that has helped me more than I could ever truly express. Are there different brands of blades that are better (sharper) than others? Thank you so very much for ALL of your tutorials!

Walmart has them for $10, thanks for showing the great tip.

Have you tried using double sided tape to hold the cane while slicing? Then just peel off once cut?

i have to see if my dad has one!

YAY! I found one for $6.50!

Hi, it's Cynthia G from HOP. Thanks for sharing this. It's a great tip!

What about putting a piece of foam or cork in the bottom of the mitre block. Rather than buying a foam backed ruler.

Mitre blocks are £3 at Hobbycraft and £1.49 at Topps Tiles - so very inexpensive here!

I also saw a video on KZfaq where they used 2 blades but placed magnets between them to slice an even cane piece

Exacto has a miter box made a metal for about $12.00 US. I would think these would be available almost world wide as it's a great hobby tool for miniatures of all types (model railroads).

Great idea. Just a thought why don't you use a square bender to keep the cane from moving backwards or bake some scrap clay in a square shape

I would add a pc of masonite cut to fit side to side and glue the ruler to it so the ruler doesn't move sideways and get crooked.

Please give out the link I hardly know anyone on Facebook that does polymer clay and thank you

To keep your ruler from slipping, get you a piece of foam insulation from the hardware store used to keep the chill from entering between the exterior door and the door sill. They are usually foam on one side and peel&stick on the other. I would stick it on the miter box so I can use the ruler for other things. ... Or what about a piece of non-skid shelf liner to put down between the ruler and miter box? Those metal rulers can be expensive. xoxo from Arizona USA.

I have watched many of your videos I wanted to tell you thank You 💕 I so need help with Cain making.God Bless You 💕

I found an inexpensive clay slicer on ebay. If I can find the link I will share it. Small and handy. Sadly with my lousy memory I cannot recall the price.

How do you slice round canes?

very clever, you could make one with 3 bits of wood

Do you have a link for a mini miter box?

... or rubber bands wound around the ruler at intervals would make it non-slip too.

With lego blocks you can make a slicer too.

He could get a popsicle stick and stick it behind it so it's right up against it

1.00 store

Ok didn't watch all yet but I had to go look - you can find them here cheap too, saw one at Ace Hardware for $7 and found also on Amazon quite a few for under $10. I was thinking myself about making something like this but my concoction is more convoluted - I might modify it to use the miter box. Honestly I had no idea they exist - this comes from being single and no man around to pick his brain lol

Just glue a thin slice of cork down the back of your ruler.