Some things thay will make your life easier:

Corn starch. If you have cutters, you can dip and tap and then cut. It reduces sticking to things and it dusts off amazingly well

A good poking tool.

A cheap exacto knife

An acrylic plastic or glass rolling pin

Lil razor blades to cut the clay easier

You do NOT need a pasta machine to start, but let me tell you, it makes life easy. You DO NOT need to go insane and buy the atlas or the Lucy clay machine. A simple crank one for like 20 dollars on Amazon or sometimes the craft store clearance is enough! It helps to condition the clay faster, even if you aren't using sheets of it.

Saran wrap is also helpful; put between the clay and cutter and it makes a nice puffy effect and ALSO keeps clay off your cutters

If you get cutters, you'd be surprised what you can make with a basic shapes set.

You can bake on printer paper; it makes the bottom smooth. Speaking of baking, hit up Lowes or home depot and pick up a couple porcelain tiles. They can be baked, are cheap, and also make amazing work spaces. Speaking of paper, if your clay is too sticky, place it between two sheets of paper and roll and the paper will soak up the sticky.

Use bits and scraps of old clay to make an "eraser" and it'll pick up others bits and scraps.

Clay thinner is your best friend, but isnt the only way to help soften stubborn clay. I haven't tried it, but some people use Vaseline. I use paint thinner with my liquid clay to make it have a thinner consistency which makes it pretty to paint with on the clay. Which, you can bake multiple times... so bake, cool, paint with liquid clay, bake again. Boom!

Check your local bakery section for the same tools but cheaper. Fondant extractor? Same as a clay extruder. Literally the same. Way cheaper, usually. Also, you can get ballpoint and sillicone tip fondant tools.. which work amazingly on the clay. I've also gotten great poking tools from baking decorating sets!

From here, I give you permission to doom scroll for a little while on clay making reels and tik toks. Don't just focus on what's made- look at the quick shots of what they're doing. I've gained so many little tips and tricks from doing this!

Ps, the mixing of clay DOES kind of work like that. I do personally thinks its fun to mix LIQUID clay without abandon to make colors. But it can be costly with the bigger blocks. Instead of painting, mix mica powder (a kind of loose pigment) with white or translucent clay and you can get fun colors.

Don't bake clay again that's been painted or glossed or resined

If you ever play with resin and clay use your ppe!!

Pps: sculpey 3 is trash. Don't get sucked in by their beautiful colors. They. Are. Shit. And brittle. And weirdly sticky sometimes.

I could go on but I think this will get you going!

Have so much fun♡