I'm An Atari Girl

Martha's newest Beveled Cross features a Cardinal in the center unlike her last one which had a rose.  Careful planning and grinding allows this bird to perch steadily within the confines of this graceful cross.

 

 

 

Susan R put the finishing touches on her latest 'Rain Gauge' which I was informed is NOT a rain gauge but a plant holder!  So that means that I mislabeled her last two pieces as well.   This doesn't measure the amount of rain but rather holds a small plant in the glass tube that you can barely see in the center of the piece! 

 

 

Nettie completed the soldering on her third and final Nativity Scene.  Next comes the part where we connect all three together.  We had an idea but I may have to re-think it...  Meanwhile, Nettie is just about finished with a small Cross and Dove Suncatcher as well.

 

 

 

Susan R is making a bird feeder that she will repurpose for use as a bird bath of sorts. She'll simply place a small container in the bottom of this filled with water and then the birds will have their own spa!

 

  

 

 

Tracey is back at work on her Cross Window and is very close to finishing it off.   She already has the center soldered and is now foiling a few remaining border pieces.  This is the part we call the 'home stretch'!

 

 

 

Lorrie's newest window is of a Bee buzzing around four white Daisies. She's grinding as she's cutting and the Bee itself already looks amazing. She also has a flower cut out over on the bottom right but the white glass isn't showing up very well against the white paper that the pattern was drawn on.

 

  

 

 

Barbara is early for Christmas with her Alligator Santa Panel. The pattern itself came from a cookie jar proving that ideas can come from anywhere!

 

 

 

 

Mary Grace has begun a new project and it's a large suncatcher in the shape of a Heart with a Cross in the center of it. As you can see, she's moving right along with it. 

 

 

 

Cindy is back in action and she has her Frog Suncatcher all cut and ground. Rather than wasting time foiling those pieces while in class she opted to work on her Louisiana Suncatcher by cutting out glass for that. She'll foil her Frog at home and then come back in with it ready to be displayed in a window.

 

  

 

 

Betty is working on a pinwheel design or possibly a geometric design.  Or is it a Flowing Ribbon?  Who knows, but it sure is pretty and colorful.  It's an old Spectrum Glass Pattern but I can't find any text on it that explicitly reveals what it is.  Nonetheless, it's gonna be a looker.

 

 

 

Kandise has her Treble Clef and Heart Suncatcher  ground and foiled which means that she'll be soldering this (as well as completing it) when she returns.  There's something about this that I really like.

 

  

 

 

Catherine foiled and tacked together the background glass for her Traditional Stained Glass Window and then picked out and strip cut the remaining 16 pieces of her border. After she skimmed them on the grinder she bagged them in four separate zip lock bags (left, top, right, and bottom) and took them along home with her so she can come in next week ready to tack and solder! 

 

 

 

Cheryl soldered the back side of her Fleur De Lis Window which means that we will, without a doubt, see this hanging up with some light behind it when we see her again next week. All it needs now are some hooks and then she'll be ready to wash and color this.

 

 

 

Bee has the first of her borders cut and ground for her Long Tall Iris Window and her color choice is spectacular! She's going to follow this up with a slightly wider clear textured border and then she'll be able begin soldering. This has always been a favorite window of mine and when I get some free time I think I'll make one again.

 

 

Kerry has all of the grinding done on her stunning Flower Window and her use of and iridized clear background blends perfectly with the colors she has used in all of her flowers. Composition is just one part of a window. Color choices, no matter how nice the pattern, will either make or break a window. In this case it definitely makes it!

 

 

 

Lara's first Flower Panel is all set to get its stamen attached when she comes back in since she got all of her soldering completed this week. The stamen won't take long at all which means that next week we are going to be over run with beautiful completed windows!

 

 

 

As I was saying, here's another window that only needs some solder added to it which in turn means that Let's Clear Abstract Window will also be featured as a finished window next week. I know that because Let would never allow a window that's this close to completion just sit around all week. This will be soldered by her while she's at home for sure!

 

 

 

Then Linda F got all of the soldering for her Vegetable Window completed while in class but we still need to get some hooks on it. Once that's done she'll wash it, color it and then hang it up as a completed project.

 

 

 

With the front of her Fish Window soldered Mary has flipped it over and begun working on the putting lead onto the back side. Since she got the front soldered in just one class I have no doubt that she'll get this finished during her next class which amounts to another completed window!

 

 

 

Sheri has her project all tacked together save for the border. She would have had that completed this week but we didn't have the frame that this will fit into and we therefore didn't want to cut any border glass without being able to double check the measurements. Measure twice, cut once! 

 

 

 

And here at the end of this weeks post we look at the fancy Flower Pot that Susan R is about to make. She got her pattern traced out onto card stock this week which means that she'll begin cutting glass when she returns!

 

 

 

 

And with that all said, thank you for your time!

  

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks 

 

I'm More Garage Sale Bougie

Lorrie's Woman in a Bathtub in a Hoop turned out to be exceptionally beautiful.  Placing it in a hoop allowed her to have negative space (in this case the walls) which is what really sets this piece off.   We've seen this pattern done before in many different ways but I've only ever seen it done as a Hoop one other time and that was when I made it that way.   I must say that Lorrie's is equally impressive.

 

 

 

Let's Cross that she completed this week is a bit of a marriage. It uses a cross whose center I could never get to work out elegantly but which works out perfectly here due to the cloth draped over it which hides the center (and makes the marriage).  Look closely you can even see a dove hidden within the cloth!

 

 

 

Susan R had a trying day but ended up finishing two of her three Rain Gauges.   The red, white and blue one even features solder 'dots along the outside edge.  In the end Susan decided to put these on stakes since we both agreed that hanging them from a chain would make them hang crookedly due to the weight of the glass tube on the front combined with any water in it.

  

 

 

Betty is knocking out more Silverware Dragonflies and this week she completed three of them (but I only took a picture of two of them).  It's a fair assumption that we know what these look like in all kinds of assorted colors.  I will say this though.  Betty's 'dotting' abilities are formidable!

Tracey is taking a bit of a break from her Cross Window by working on this picture frame. She only had a few pieces left to go before she begins grinding which means that this project will be a very short diversion from her much larger Cross Window.

 

 

Let is about to begin a clear Geometric Window complete with assorted bevels. This should go together lickety-split for her since all of the bevel work has been completed.

 

 

 

Catherine's  Standard Stained Glass Design is moving right along.  She's already got the centerpiece cut ground and foiled which means that she'll tack this together when she comes in and will then cut the background for it.  That should go fairly quickly.

Bee's Long Tall Iris Window is coming together in a delightful way. Now that there's only a stem left to cut for the main scene I'd say that she'll be needing to pick out some border glass soon. 

 

 

Julie's got all but one piece of her background glass cut and ground. She'll wrap these when she comes back in and then work on her final border! I knew the background would go quickly if she cut it from one piece of glass as a whole rather than individual pieces spread about on the glass.  That's always the case.

 

  

  

With her last border cut, ground, wrapped and tacked into place Cheryl has begun soldering her Fleur De Lis Window.   I don't think it will be long before we see this hanging up in its completed form.

 

 

 

Lara ground all of her glass for her Flower Window and has it all foiled and ready to be tacked together. She's picked out some wonderful glass beads to form the flower's stamen but that won't get attached until the entire window has been completely soldered.

 

  

 

Sheri has made excellent progress on her Polygonal Window.  She's pretty sure that she's going to add an initial to the center of it by making a suncatcher of the letter 'D' and then tacking it into place on top of all of her triangles.  You should know that what you see below is just three quarters of her entire window.  It's all that would fit on the longest board that we had at the time so she's making this in two different sections and then tacking them together to form one large window.

  

  

This is Annette's third and final panel for her Nativity scene. She still has to solder the back side of this camel but once that's done she'll be ready to add channel and fit the three windows together.

 

 

Martha's latest Cross features a Cardinal in its center and it appears as though she's all set for soldering next week. She was able to complete the grinding on it this week and even even managed to get everything foiled as well! That's fast work but it's also accurate work which is the most important part of making stained glass.

 

 

And in the end we see that Mary has her first inner border attached to her Fish Window and that she's hard at work foiling her last border. She asked what she's going to end up doing for the hook part of the fishing line and I explained that we will add a wire hook once the window is finished (much like Lara's window).

 

 

And that, as they say, was the way the croissant crumbled this week.

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Quick, What's Your Blood Type

When Betty brought in a picture and asked if it was possible to do a window similar to it we all told her that the picture was made through AI.  There were plenty of impossible cuts and coloration that's downright impossible to do with real glass.   That said, we drew out a pattern based on the AI design and then made modifications throughout it until she ended up with this gorgeous window!   It would appear that AI has a purpose in stained glass after all.

 

 

When Linda brought in a picture and asked if it were possible to do a Hoop design similar to it she was also informed that what she was looking at was generated through AI.  Yet again we used that for inspiration and made a pattern that was not only possible but extremely precious as well.   Like Betty's Blue Rose, Linda's Bluejay Hoop turned out absolutely lovely!

 

 

 

Lorrie's Turtle Window was completed and it really lit up beautifully once it was off of the table. The Starfish that was barely apparent is now 100% visible against the brown sea floor. The green leaves stand out perfectly in the water, the shell of the turtle is made of a beautiful mottled green glass and the eye of the turtle is absolutely stunning!

 

 

Here's a closeup of the Turtle's eye.

 

 

 

When Kandise began making this Peacock she wanted something that would simply hang in a window. When she wanted it larger I was concerned about how it would hang because of all of the weight the larger pieces would add. When she asked if we could put it in a hoop I initially thought that there was no way it would fit since it had to span 8 inches along two joint sections that we did not plan for this.  Low and behold, in the end it worked perfectly and this bird not only looks stunning but is as sturdy as it could ever hoop to be. (Dad-jokes abound with me.)

 

Martha's Rose In A Cross is spectacular because of her use of bevels and clear textured glass. The Rose is so prominent in front of all of the clear textures that you can't help but look again to see just what else is included in this finished piece! She'll be started a very similar pattern next week.

Let was as busy as a bee turning out 3 completed projects in one class.  The first is this Stylized Heart design that she embellished with solder dots throughout the lead lines.  It's a tedious process but the end result makes up for the time well spent working in all of that detail.

 

 

This stylish Art Nouveau window is the second of Let's finished pieces and her use of color and her mastery of symmetry makes it a standout for sure.

 

 

 

Then Let went ahead and made this Flower in a Heart design which she also accessorized with dotted drops of solder as well as scalloped foil around the outside edges.

 

This week Cheryl finished her second Bevel Cross using a bevels for both the cross itself as well as the corners of the border.  The background was made from wispy white glass while the border was cut from a pure solid white sheet.  Stunning.

 

 

Oh look, a Butterfly! That can only mean one thing--we have a 'new' student! Actually Catherine made a window with us way back in 2009 so technically she's not new and her precision cutting and grinding on this shows that she obviously paid attention the first time around! Expect to see her begin a full fledged window next week.

Hoops are becoming fashionable again as Lorrie has decided to tackle the Lady In a Bathtub pattern that I had modified to be made in a hoop.  It's simple enough but it does require some accurate cutting and grinding so that everything lines up correctly.  I have no doubt that Lorrie will handle it wonderfully. 

  

Elaine has elected to make a series of Suncatchers which she will string together to form one coherent piece when she's completed them all.   That's thinking outside the box and that's what I like!  In just one class she's managed to cut, grind, and foil this first flower.  This will be finished in minutes upon her return!

 

After the work on her Peacock was done Kandise decided to cut and grind this highly stylized Musical Treble Clef. I have to admit that I love this design and can't wait to see it hanging!

  

 

Bee's Iris Window is all cut out save for the border(s).  The only thing left for her to grind is the clear textured background glass that she picked and cut with the greatest of ease.   The pattern doesn't show a border but I'm going to press her to do a double border on this because I've seen it done both ways and believe that it lacks something with just a single border.

 

 

Susan D is building a wooden Bird House but is switching up the original design by making two small glass flaps on each side that will allow her to get into the house.  Then, as the coup de grace, Susan will add a slanted roof made entirely of glass.  Expect to see said glass next week as she works on shingling her roof.

 

 

 

Julie got her flowers tacked together and then set forth on filling in their centers with small circular yellow florets which she cut, ground and foiled with complete ease. We didn't have the glass she wanted for her background (yet) so she then worked on cutting, grinding and foiling the first of her two borders! Now that's what I call progress.

 

 

 

Linda F has redesigned the mushrooms in the bottom right of her Vegetable Window and now there's no mistaking what they are. Most people just stick with what a pattern shows even if they feel it's off but I always say, "CHANGE IT!" which is exactly what Linda did here. I re-adjust patterns all the time especially when I do one a second time which is what's happening here since Linda has made this once before. Now that her green border has been cut she'll be ready to solder this before you know it. 

 

 

 

And speaking of refining stained glass patterns, Lara's re-cut flower petal already looks better to me. She's grinding everything now and as you can see the lower portion fits together beautifully.

 

 

Wow, I just love the assorted pinks that Keri has used throughout her Flower Window. I'm not entirely sure but I believe they might be Peonies.  No matter what they are technically named they sure do prove that using multiple, similar colors throughout a flower helps to give it a huge boost of realism. 

 

 

This is the second of three Rain Gauges that Susan R is making. She has the first one soldered but I still need to see how she wants these to be displayed. She can either hang them or put them in the ground on a stake. We'll get the answer to that burning question when she comes back into class.

 

  

 

MiMi is fully seeing the light at the end of the tunnel! In fact, it  barely seems to be a tunnel because she's that far out already when it comes to soldering the inside of her lamp.

  

  

 

 

And in the end, Cheryl has all of her background ground and also has all but one piece left to foil.   That means that she'll get her final border on this when she comes back in next week.   This is looking really good! 

 

 

 

And with all of that the only left to say is, "Stay glassy!"

 

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks