Another Little Victim

Our tip of the week would make a great bumper sticker.  Slow Down!   Too much speed is the root of all of our students problems.  You can do something quickly over and over again or you can slow down and do it once the correct way saving yourself a lot of time and aggravation.   I watch people cut glass while they are paying the least amount of attention they can to actually following the line they are trying to cut.  The end result is a piece that's close but nowhere good enough.   Taking your time while cutting (moving slowly!) will speed things up immensely later on down the road.  Cutting glass isn't a race.  We seek quality cuts over a quantity of bad cuts.

One more time:  SLOW DOWN!!!

Let's start things off by saying that Linda F's Rose Heart Window is every bit as stunning as I expected it to be.  I may very well make one of these myself because I think it looks even better in person than it does in its pictures.  What a wonderful job Linda did on the soldering-- it adds so much to the window's appeal.

Rowena's Victorian Window is complete and a feast for the eyes.   She added a small round bevel in the center to help diffuse the flood of lead that all of those connecting lead lines would have created and it even tied in nicely with the four other circles that reside in the pattern.  Wonderful work all around.

Tasha's Cat Window is officially completed and it definitely has a Tasha 'ring' to it.  She has a unique style and it certainly shines through in this window.   I just wish the cat's whiskers were more evident in the picture because they really add a lot to the overall effect.

 

Betty completed her Multi Colored Cross Window and put all of the textured glass on the front of her window.  When using clear textures this isn't something that needs to be done but when using colored glass the texture is much more apparent on the back of the glass.  Because of that, Betty cut most of her pieces out backwards so she could then turn them around so the texture would be on the front side of the window.   Betty did a great job all around on this.

Linda F also put the finishing touches on her stylized Cross Suncatcher which she made with some leftover Fractures and Streamers Glass that she had.   Sometimes the glass makes the project and that is certainly the case with this project.

Carol made two Sunflower Lawn Ornaments this week and she needs no help at all when it comes to putting these together.  As always, her work is flawless.

Terry both started and finished this Large Cross Suncatcher in class this week and her use of just two simple textures is what really makes this look so stunning. 

Barbara H started working on a pair of Airplane Kaleidoscopes and is just about ready to begin assembling these into two separate Air Planes.

Tracey's address Window is well under construction as she now has both of the decorative end pieces all ground and ready to be wrapped.  You can see one of these end piece sections to the right of the numbers.

  

 

Tracey  also worked on an Airplane Kaleidoscope of her own and I've put one of the finished Kaleidoscopes that I've made next to her green pieces so you can see exactly what she and Barbara's pieces will look like when they are assembled.

 

Cindy is making excellent headway a logo panel and as you can see from the picture she's done a great job translating it to stained glass. When she returns we're going to add some teeth to the shark and that will REALLY make this even more picture perfect than it already is.

As expected, Lara got the lion's share of her background cut out for her Flower Of Life Window this week.  In fact, there are only eight pieces left to cut and then she'll be able to move on to the border for this window.  I just knew that this project would go quickly for her.

Susan D was busy working on Mickey Mouse Silhouette Suncatchers this week along with a beveled heart or two.  We'll surely see some of these completed when she comes back in.

This week we got to see Jan start on her abstract Poppy Window.   What you see is just the subject of the window because when this section gets tacked together Jan will add even more background glass and a border to make it much bigger than pictured below.

 

I only just realized the Linda L and Susan D are both working on identical projects.   Just like Susan D, I expect to see at least some of these completed upon Linda's return.

Martha was hard at work wrapping two bevel clusters; a boat and a lighthouse.  They will both end up being part of a single window which she'll start cutting glass for when she comes back next week.

Patrice started a Bumble Bee Lawn Ornament this week and she already has it all cut out and halfway ground.   There's a good chance that this will be all tacked together when she returns to class next week.

 

Melissa's Sacred Hearts Window is REALLY taking shape.   Both of the hearts have been cut out and the roses have already been cut into one of them.  The twisted thorn stems should be quick and painless after those roses and then the rest of the window will be a walk in the park.

Myrt got her Dog Face tacked together and then she ripped its snout off when she decided that she didn't like the way it looked.  The mouth appeared crooked to her and I applaud her for going through the extra work to make it look right rather than allowing it to be 'off'.

 

Mary Grace tacked together all of the pieces that she had ground and wrapped for her Iris Window and as you can see there really aren't that many pieces left to fill in before she can start working on the double border for this.

  

With just about everything wrapped in her Sea Horses Window, Becky will soon be ready to add her background glass.   To be honest, those large pieces will easily be cut in just one class so this will be done before you know it.

 

 

Roy spent his time in class soldering his Crab Window.  As you can see it is just about finished and although Roy plans on completing it while at home during the week he said that he would bring it back in so we could get a good picture of it.  His use of mottled glass works really well with this design and really gives this crab an extra boost of realism. I can't wait to see what he decides to do next.

 

Shelley got all of the center portion of her Cat Window tacked together.  She'll be adding a 'nameplate' between the bottom of the cat and the border and she's got her pattern pieces all traced onto the glass ready to be cut.  

 
Susan R's Chef Window is moving along at a nice pace and although she cut out mostly white pieces of glass that are hard to see on the pattern, she got an awful lot accomplished.  Before you know it Susan will be laying down the floor to this window.

 

Beth traced out and cut out all of her paper pattern for the Flower Window that she's about to start.   She planned on cutting some of this while she was at home but I have her box of tools so I don't think that's going to happen!  Nonetheless, we WILL see glass cut for this when Beth comes back in.

  

Brenda has begun work on a logo window of her own and between the two of us we got the final pattern ironed out this week. There are a lot of letters in this design so Brenda will be spending a lot of time getting them to line up perfectly. There's nothing worse that a window featuring bad handwriting!

 

And that wraps things up this week.  Memorial Day threw me off a bit so this is a day late, but it's here now and that's all that matters.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks