I Need Some Professional Help

Betty's Lilies Window is downright stunning and demonstrates how mixing different glasses of the same color can really bring a window to life.  In this case Betty used two different greens as well as two different whites to provide subtle shading throughout the flowers and leaves.  The icing on this beautiful window is her use of wire work to make stamens for the flowers.

 

Lorrie has been very busy this week as you will see.   Her Sun and Moon Window looks fantastic and she's learning so much with each and every window that she finishes.  Looking at this it's hard to believe that she's actually one of our new students!

 

 

 

Lorrie also completed her Chicken Logo Window that was made for a friend of hers.   With all of those pieces her friend should be very impressed, especially since it matches the logo perfectly. Let us call this another job well done.

 

  

 

 

Betty finished her Poppies Teardrop Suncatcher which looks as wonderful as her previous teardrop designs. She really likes the teardrop designs and she spent some of her class time redesigning the sunflower teardrop pattern that she had completed last week.  There's almost always something that you wish you'd done differently after making a pattern for the first time and fixing it instead of remaking it the same way is the sign of someone who cares about their work.

 

 

I'll bet you thought we were done looking at Lorrie's completed projects but no, there's one more.  Her large Fairy Suncatcher was something that she wanted to do because she wanted to get some smaller items under her belt so that she could practice her tap-tap method around the edges.  I have to say that she did a wonderful job all around on this, no pun intended!

 

 

Last week I showed you Steve's Southern Belle Window but the individual panels had actually only been laid out on the table after which I Photoshopped them into a Window Frame to show you what it would look like.  This week Steve worked on mounting each piece into the actual Window and when it was finished I was able to take this picture of the actual completed piece with some light behind it.  As you can see, the back lighting makes a BIG difference which is why I'm posting this again.

 

 

 

 

I was fortunate enough to gain a Great Niece three months ago and since we were going to see her during the holiday week I made this three dimensional Rocking Horse as a gift to decorate her room.  These rocking horse patterns have been around since the 70's but I always thought they were a bit clunky looking and very simplistic.  I wanted more for Emma so I put my pencil to paper and came up with this pattern.  If I'm perfectly honest, I think it turned out much better than I expected even though the mane had me do a slight redesign after I had everything cut out.

 

 

 

MiMi wrapped up the foiling of her Birds On A Branch Suncatcher and will tack this together and solder it when she returns.  It already looks stunning and MiMi made the entire process look easy.  I'm surprised that we haven't seen more of these made but perhaps after this is completed someone else will want a go at it.

  

Ann is back and she cut out all of the pieces to make a Geometrical Torus Suncatcher. She also cut out all of one of the colors for a second Torus so that she will have a head start on a second one when she gets around to making it.   I have to say that she's flying through this pattern!

 

 

Let began this Large Heart with Beveled Stars Suncatcher begun and it's already been ground.  All this needs is some foil and a good soldering to finish it off.

  

 

 

As I'd suspected, Melissa finished grinding the handful of pieces that she didn't get to last week and then began wrapping everything in copper foil.   She's got a border glass all picked out for this window and she's going to need to think about what she plans on making next because this will be finished soon.

 

 

 

Martha's Peacock Window has its background cut and attached and then she went to work on the double border.  Since the inner border is made of bevels she already had them wrapped and tacked together.  That left just the final blue/green border left to cut and as you can see she was able to cut the strips and then break them down into their individual pieces.

 

 

 

Lisa completed all of the cutting and grinding on Bubbles The Duck which means that this could be finished by the next time we see it.  I know that Bubbles still needs to be foiled but Lisa has already started that so there isn't all that much left to go.

 

 

 

Lara got her Three Tulip Panel cut, ground, wrapped and then tacked together.  Once that was done she picked out a perfect color for her border glass and then got that cut, ground and foiled.   There's only some soldering left to go on this and I'm thinking that may well happen when we see Lara again.

 

  

 

 

With her inner clear reeded border cut, ground, wrapped and attached to her Carousel Horse Window Linda F next picked out the glass for her final border.  The blue baroque that she chose is perfect-- it's bright enough to stand out against all of the other colors in this window without clashing or overpowering the horse or carousel itself. 

 

 

 

Susan D finished the arduous task of wrapping all of her glass globs and then she arranged them according to color to create a random appearance.  Look closely and you can see a blue bird which will have some wire work applied to it to give it a wing.   Susan is officially ready to cut her tree trunk and the green grass that surrounds it after she gets the glass globs attached to the hoop.  This will be completed before you know it. 

  

 

 

Susan R has almost all of her BBQ Gnome cut with only the shirt and pants left to go.  She also has all of the pieces that she's already cut out ground so there's a lot more completed on this then you might first believe.  I'll take a cheeseburger, please.

  

 

Let's Heron Window is nearing completion and I have no doubt that it WILL be complete6d when you see it again.  She got the border and the channel attached to it this week and since the front is already soldered that only leaves the back side left to go.

 

 

 

Barbara has most of her Multi Colored Owl ground and will soon cut up and separate the pieces that make up iris of the Owl's eyes.  This is the easiest way to handle small same-colored pieces-- cut and grind a larger piece so that fits into place and then cut it into its individual pieces so that all you have to do is lightly skim the fresh cuts and achieve a perfect fit.

 

  

 

 

Cheryl was hard at work on her Harley-Davidson Window and has her center letters cut and ready to be ground.  This week she worked out all of her background pieces and traced them onto black glass which she will begin cutting when she returns.  She'll be making this window in three distinct sections and tacking each one as she progresses to prevent things from growing and to prevent anything from sliding out of position.

 

  

 

 

June got her border attached to Mr. Vader and then set upon soldering him.  The front side is almost complete and that means that she'll flip this around to do the back side sometime during her next class.   The end is near for Darth Vader, that's for sure!

 

 

 

Judy has all of her Scottish Thistle ground and wrapped so she'll be ready to tack this together as soon as she comes back in.  Once that's done she'll pick a color for the thin border that surrounds it and which will make hanging this much easier.

 

 

 

Cindy's Cinderella Window got all of its sky cut and ground so she's ready to begin foiling all of those pieces and then concentrate on what she wants to do for a border to surround this.  One or two borders?  We'll learn the answer to that when she comes back in next week.

 

 

And to wrap things up here, Bee resumed work on designing the pattern for her Ed's Cantina Window and she's very close to being happy with it.   She also picked out a font for the lettering that with go in the banner that runs across the top of the window and all I can say is that computers sure help a lot in that aspect of the design process.

 

 

Well, the 4th of July threw off our schedule but now that this has been posted we'll be right on tome again late Monday.  See you then!

 

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Bubbles In The Pond

Steve's Southern Belle Window might just very well be his finest hour (so far).   Made up of six smaller panels which form the overall portrait of a lady, Steve has mounted each of them into a window frame that he stumbled upon a while back.   As you can see, these six panels have transformed a plain window frame into one very stunning Window.  The face that he painted onto this Belle is impressive and he should be very proud of all of his work on this. Oh and the icing on this 'cake' is that Steve drew the pattern himself!

 

 

 

Zoe's Deer Window was completed and let me tell you that her work on this window blew me away.  It's hard to believe that she's never made a stained glass window before because everything about this is perfection.   Zoe's going to be making some wonderful things with us, that's for sure.

 

 

 

 

Betty made these two large Teardrop Flower Suncatchers with her Double Sunflower being slightly smaller than the single Sunflower.  The perimeters on each of these are flawless without any inside dips, humps or sharp points which is so very important when making a suncatcher since there is no channel to hide any edge imperfections.

 

 

 

 Lisa finished her Multi-colored Cat Desk Ornament and it looks vibrant and amazing.   The wire whiskers added so much to the overall look of this piece and I'm thrilled that she didn't want to skip the extra work that they involved.  The old adage is certainly true, "Little things mean a lot."

 

 

 

Let made this beautiful large Circular Flower Suncatcher and her attention to symmetry is what makes this look so good.  For some reason it reminds me of the Hex Signs that I used to see on barns.  Check out the last picture in this post for an example of that. 

Zoe needed to come up with something new to make this week and she's decided to make a Bee Panel which is smaller than you might think when you first look at the picture here.   It's only 6 inches wide so that means her cutting and grinding will be of the utmost importance since the lines of the pattern leave no room for any error but after looking at what she's already cut out I have to say that she's going to have no problems whatsoever with this.

 

 

Betty's Lilly Window is so far along that she's already got the front side soldered.   She attached her brass channel before she called it a day and I won't be surprised to see this among our completed projects when we see it again.

  

 

Barbara's Multi-colored Owl has been all cut out and now she's working on grinding it. She's left each of the large purple eyes as one piece and will cut them into their smaller respective shapes now that they've been ground to fit into place.   Once she cuts these up (like a pizza) everything will drop into place easily without the need for grinding 10 small pieces individually.

  

 

Mary Grace has come up with a Teardrop Flower Hanging of her own.   These teardrops seem to be catching on in popularity here in class.  This week Mary Grace not only cut hers out but got it completely ground as well.  It fits together wonderfully and will surely look wonderful when it's completed.

 

 

Lisa began this large Duck Suncatcher that will actually be mounted on top of a piece of driftwood rather than hanging on a window.  She's named him Bubbles and he's a lot of fun!

 

Meanwhile, Susan R has begun work on a new Garden Gnome.  This guy appears to be working over a grill so we're going to be calling him the BBQ Gnome from here on out.  She has almost all of the glass cut so Susan will surely be at the grinder next week.

  

 

MiMi has her Birds on a Branch all ground and she's decided that since this piece is so small she will use black beads for the eyes of the birds.   She'll be able to attach them on both the front and back and the reason she's using beads is because even the small 1/4" grinding bit would make eyes that are too large for these small birds.

 

  

 

Cindy's Cinderella Window (I called her Snow White last week-- Whoops!) has it's sky all cut out and she also got half of it ground.  You can already see what this window will look like upon completion save for the border that will surround everything.  I believe we'll see what color she chooses for that when she comes back in next week.

 

 

 

Melissa worked hard on grinding her Tulip Window and came so very close to finishing the grinding.   She's already managed to pick out her border color and it's going to tie everything together nicely.  I'm sure she'll begin wrapping these pieces upon her return and then she'll be ready to tack. 

  

 

 

Let has her Heron Window almost ready to be borderized.  She still has some of her clear glue chip background left to grind but she'll surely make short work of that while she's at home.   The end (of this project) is near.

 

 

 

Linda F has only one piece left to go in her Carousel Horse Window and then she'll tack this and add a double border to it.  She's already picked out the two border's colors and let me tell you that they are really going to make this window turn some heads. 

 

 

 

And both Mickey and Minnie Mouse are quickly coming together under Linda L's artful hands.  Linda has an iron frame in the shape of a large Mickey's head which can hold three circular pieces of glass-- two smaller circles for the ears and then a larger one for the face.   Linda has decided to put these silhouette's in each ear and will then make a larger scene of Mickey in a bathing suit to place in to the face section.  This will obviously be and outside piece that will decorate Linda's pool. 

 

 

 

Susan D spent her time in class wrapping glass globs.  It's a tedious process but by the time class ended she only had a small handful of them left to wrap.   I'm thinking that she'll be tacking this together when she comes back in. 

  

 

 Lorrie's Sun and Moon Window has been officially soldered and only needs to have its front side touched up.  The back side is perfection but there are typically run-throughs and such that need attention after the back of a window is completed.   That won't take long at all though so expect to see this only one more time because Lorrie will certainly complete this next week.

 

 

 

Martha got all of her Peacock Window ground and worked out a series of bevels to form a beveled inner border to surround it.   As always, we like to assemble a beveled border BEFORE we cut and grind the background.  The size of a bevel cannot easily be changed unlike any glass that is picked for a background.

 

 

 

Annette resumed soldering the back side of her New Orleans Scene and is making more and more progress with each passing week.   There are a lot of lead lines in this window and since the majority of her pieces are thin and fragile she has to be careful to not allow heat to build up in any one spot which could easily crack her glass.   Slow but steady is the ONLY way to handle this window.

 

  

 

Lastly, here's a picture of a barn with some Hex Signs on it that Let's window reminds me of.  I'll bet you thought I'd forget to post this, didn't you?

And there you have it.  Another weeks worth of progress in one easy to digest blog post!

 

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Bow Down

Let has a new Flower Window under her belt (figuratively speaking, of course) and like all of her previous windows there is nothing to criticize on this.  She's used shading between the inner and outer flower petals of the flowers perfectly and her transparent green background ties everything together beautifully.

 

Susan R completed her Pair Of Chefs Panel and accented it with two wire work mustaches and dots of black glass paint for the eyes.  Her purple border ties in with the purple wine perfectly.  I always say that when in doubt you should pick the least used color in your window and then echo it in the border.  It doesn't have to match perfectly-- in fact, most times having a slight variation works even better than a perfect match!

 

 

 

Linda L's Drake Panel may become a snowball rolling down a snowy hill because now other members of her family are asking when she will make them a panel with their name in it.  As always, Linda's cutting and grinding are wonderful which resulted in perfectly scripted letters.

 

 

 

Annette's Rose and Cross Window was made throughout the month that we took off for vacation.  She brought it in this week with only the soldering left to go on it and she completed it well before class was over with.  Her use of a pastel pink gives this window a nice soft, calming effect.

 

 

 

 

Let also made and altered the pattern for this colorful Heart which features a heart bevel off centered inside of the Heart itself.  A perfectly aligned perimeter is of the utmost importance on this pattern because you can't use channel on it due to the curved edge.   This pattern is about tap-tapping a leaded bead along the outer edge after making sure that everything lines up perfectly.

 

 

Sheri got her two Tropical Leaf Flowerpot Decorations finished by adding a brass rod to the back of each leaf.  I actually cut the rods off while editing the picture and realize now that I probably shouldn't have.  She found a brass rod at Tractor Supply  which was long enough to cut into four lengths that are each suitable for Flowerpot decorations.  That means that she's got two left over so perhaps we will see more of these in the weeks to come.

 

 

 

Lorrie made this Stained Glass Feather from start to finish while she was in class and then moved back on over to one of the windows that she was working on last week.  We'll see that a little further along in this post.   As for her feather, well, it's perfect!

Wow, wow, WOW!  Check out the face that Steve painted on his Southern Belle Window!  He used Pebeo Vitrea 160 Glass Paint and will allow it to dry for 24 hours.   His next step is to put the painted face (just the piece of glass, not the entire window- this 'firing' process must be done before the window is soldered together) into his oven at home where he will heat it to 325°F for 40 minutes.  After that those eyes, nose, and lips will only come off if you scrubs at them with a a razor blade, and who would want to do that to this Beautiful Southern Bell!

  

 

Susan D got the bird cut for her Autumn Tree Hoop as well as getting all of the glass globs ground.  Now comes the fun wrapping phase for this beautiful circular window.  The tree trunk and the ground will be cut and attached AFTER the globs have been tacked into position so that they attach perfectly.

 

 

 

 

MiMi has started her Five Birds On A Branch Window Hanging and her color choices are currently superb.   She has only one bird left to cut out and to pick colors for but I have no doubt that it will match perfectly in the marvelous color scheme that she's already defined here.

  

 

 

Lara began cutting her Three Tulips Panel and before class was over with she had everything cut as well as having some of this tiny 4x4 window ground. She's making this look easier than it really is because 4x4 means that she is dealing with a lot of tiny pieces and they are the hardest things to deal with when it comes to grinding (and foiling).

 

  

 

 

Melissa did a lot of cutting throughout the week which is evident by the fact that she's already grinding the pieces for her Tulip Window.   Her background (as well as all other color choices) is perfection because it's a wispy blue glass that's somewhat transparent.  Because of the transparency her flowers are going to be the focal point of the window and they have been cut from glass that is just as wonderful a choice as Melissa's sky was.

 

  

 

 

Lisa is back and we're glad to see her smiling face again.  She started grinding on her multi-colored Corner Cat and then foiled it as well.   At that point she called it a day because she didn't want to tack it together and let it sit for any length of time before she could actually solder it.  That means that this will surely be completed upon her return next week.

 

  

 

 

Let is never one to stand still (unless she's working at her grinder).   She made this Circular Flower  Window and will be soldering it so that she can start another new project next week when this becomes finished.  This is another example of a perfectly aligned perimeter that can't get a channel around it to hide any flaws.   And as always, Let has achieved an extremely high degree of accuracy here.

 

  

 

 

Cheryl is feeling VERY adventurous because this week we got to see her begin a very detailed Harley-Davidson Window.  There's a lot to line up here but Cheryl is going to take things one section at a time.  She's started things off by cutting out the letters for the words HARLEY DAVIDSON and when she returns she'll cut out the background glass for those letters.  Once they've been ground and wrapped in foil she will tack that section together and then wash all of the flux off of that section before moving on to either the MOTOR or the CYCLES word section.

 

 

 

This is the second project that Lorrie worked on this week.   She had the center with the Hen and the Laurel Wreath ground and mostly wrapped when she came in.  After completing her stained glass Feather she resumed work on this by tacking everything together and then cutting, grinding, and foiling the border.  That's what you call making the most of your class time.

 

  

 

 

Last week I told you all that I was going to suggest that Cindy re-cut the arms and the hair of Snow White and this week Cindy agreed.  And now that she has some color to her and you can see the end result of making that change.  I think that I can safely say that I was correct yet again.  LOL

 

 

 

After getting her purple background glass cut out Judy then took to the grinder where she had no trouble at all getting everything fitted together perfectly.   She's pinned all of her pieces down and when she comes back in she will begin foiling everything.   Once it's wrapped and tacked she can begin to work on her border.

 

 

 

This is the back side of Annette's New Orleans Scene.  Why are we looking at the back?  Well it's because she has all of the front soldered already!  This has been a test for her but a test that she's passing with flying colors.  She worries that it's taken so long to get to this point but you can't rush a window like this.   It gets made slower than most other windows simply because it's made up of so many tiny, intricate pieces.  Besides, it's never about speed-- it's ALWAYS about quality!

  

 

 

Zoe's Deer Window is so closed to being completed that I hate not being able to post the finished picture of it here.   But at least that means that I'll get a beautiful picture of it for our next post when I don't believe we will be seeing a lot of completed items which will give this window the spot light.  Zoe's work is amazing and I can't wait to see what new project she begins  when she comes back into class.

 

Since we are speaking of windows that are very nearly finished let's look in on Bee's LSU Plaque.  She's got it all ground and foiled and ready to begin soldering.   This is about 12 inches wide which means that there really isn't a lot to solder so expect to see this completed when she returns and expect to see what she plans on making next.

  

 

Sheri has a pair of Flower Crosses under construction with one of them being wrapped and tacked together while the second one is ground and ready to be foiled.   These went together pretty darned quickly for Sheri which is a testament to how far along she's come as a glass artist.

 

 

And to wrap things up we look at the Corner Owl Pattern that Barbara is about to embark upon.  She wanted to do a Bookend piece and really liked the Owl Pattern that everyone else loves to make as a large suncatcher.   We scanned it into the computer, scaled it down to 5 inches wide and then angled him so he would fit into the slots of one of the wooden Bookends.  This is the end result and Barbara will begin cutting into her scrap glass next week.

  

 

 

We are well back into the swing of things so get ready to see more incredible work done by our students in just seven days!

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks