It's been eleven months in the making and this week we get to see Cheryl's completed Harley-Davidson Window. That may sound like a long time but there were many, many missed weeks during those months. Also, this isn't a beginners window by any means. There are plenty of tiny pieces and the letters needed to be perfect for it to be legible. Flowers can deviate from the pattern here and there but letters not so much. Congratulations Cheryl on following through!
Ann's first Chicken Head is what the word whimsical is all about and although it's a word that I don't use often it fits the bill perfectly here. This was designed to be displayed in the extreme lower corner of a window so that it appears as though the chicken were outside looking in. All I can say is, "Mission accomplished!"
Jan knocked out her Sunburst Flower Window and the two pieces that she redrew /added due to breakage are not perceivable at all. Her use of a heavily textured clear glass for the border sets it apart from the background glass so that the border is plainly evident while keeping all of the color within the center focal point. Nice!
Shelly's Tribute Window to her dear cat Toot's is ready to be displayed in a window at her house. He may be gone but he's with her as long as Shelley remembers him and this window will certainly make sure of that.
Cindy's newest Catch-All Tray features the same ears of corn that her last one did but this time around we see that she has a Crayfish on the opposite side rather than a Shrimp. Both of Cindy's Catch-all Trays make such a cute and stunning pair that it would be a shame for them to go to two different houses. Here's hoping that they can stay together!
Linda L is using up all of the stained glass items that she's purchased over the years and this is the first of a number of 3D dragonflies that she's making. Now that she's finished the first one and knows exactly how everything goes together I'm sure that she'll be able to assemble them faster than you can say 1...2...3!
As promised here's a look at the three Mickey Mouse Heads that Linda L made for her pool decoration now that they have been assembled. The frame work itself was instantly recognizable even when it was empty but Linda's three stained glass additions really make this shine!
Susan D has all of her planter and individual leaves soldered which means that when she returns she will tack solder everything together and then add tinned wires to form the stems and vines of the leaves. The final touch will be three wires to make the basket appear to be hanging from ropes the way a hanging planter would.
These cute little Doggies were cut, ground and foiled while Let was at home this week. She came into class, picked out a background glass, cut it and is now grinding it. I think it's fairly safe to say that Let will be picking out a border for this upon her return.
Mary Grace has decided to make five Frames and this here is the first one. She's making this in its entirety to make sure that everything lines up and balances out before she makes the other four. This just needs to have three more pieces foiled and then she'll solder it and make a pair of 'legs' so this can stand on a table. And we'll see that completed next week.
Cindy has embarked on a Baseball Window that will feature a name inside of the banner that cuts across the ball. Alas, Cindy has learned that this can be no more that 12 x 12 inches (smaller than what it is now) and thus will end up doing some re-cutting when she comes back in. Looking at this I'm thinking that Cindy may not have realized that the circular item behind the banner is a baseball and it should be white rather than red.
Betty's Curved Geometric Window is not only all cut out but ground as well. She's about to begin foiling after which she'll tack it together and solder it all up. This won't need a border for two reasons: 1) It would introduce too much 'straightness' to a window that features curves everywhere and 2) luckily enough there are enough lines to attach the channel and even the hooks that this will hang by. I believe that this window will hang as a diamond rather than a square and if you're not following me on that you'll see what I mean when it's been completed.
Although it's hard to see while it's lying there on the work table, the color that Linda F Picked for her final border is root beer. It's a glass that gives a nice wooden frame effect to any window that it surrounds and it makes a far, far better choice than a bland neutral color. Me, I'm a little shocked that Linda didn't go with a green border since that's her favorite color!
The sheet of glass that Judy picked out for her background wasn't wide enough to reach across her window so she has a few pieces missing. However, there is enough glass left over in the drop off at the bottom to fill in those missing pieces and that will happen AFTER what you see in the picture has been ground, foiled and tacked together. That said, I'm thinking that we'll see those three missing pieces filled in next week.
Let is officially ready to solder her Mardi Gras Mask Window now that her double borders have been attached. We still need to add some channel around the outside edge but that will only take a few minutes at most and Let will still able to flip this window over and solder the second side even without the channel being applied because all of the
glass has been attached and that makes it OK to flip this window over to its back side to solder.
With all of her glass both cut and ground Lorrie has moved on to the foiling stage of her 'Sugar' Elephants. She's already got a respectable amount of glass foiled (in just one night) so the places where her lead lines will reside are now slowly being revealed.
This Tiger Face is coming together quickly. Bee held up a huge, long and twisty piece to me and said that there was no way that she (or anyone else for that matter) would be able to make a piece like that happen without it cracking when it's soldered and I agreed. Without any coaxing at all she said, "I think we should split it here to make life easier" and I can't give her enough praise for that. Sometimes patterns contain pieces that can't or shouldn't be cut in just one piece (most times it's just an oversight in the design process) but students can be reluctant to add cuts just because they are NOT on the pattern. Thankfully, Bee is NOT one of those students!
MiMi has just 4 large egg cartons of glass left to grind before she can wrap her pieces and then tack together the first one third of her Louis XV Lamp. Slow and steady wins the race but MiMi's grinding here is nothing short of perfection and makes the anticipation very much worth the wait.
Lara's Stack Of Books is moving right along and it looks like the only thing left to cut out on this are the pages of those books. And the thing is, all of those red lines that make up the pages are actually wire work so there's only a few simple pieces left to cut on this project.
With the flat portion of her Sunflower repair all re-cut and tacked together, Paula will attach the 3D elements that surround the gynoecium of the flower (the brown center) when she returns. That means that this will easily be completed when we next see it.
Kandise has all of her pieces cut, ground, wrapped and tacked together which means that she'll be able to solder this when she comes back in. There's actually not much to solder her but there sure is a lot of tap-tapping around the edges of this oversized suncatcher which will take a lot of time to accomplish. Also, there will be some hidden wire along the width of this hidden in the solder on the back side to give it some extra strength.
Lastly, all of June's border has been tacked into place and her front side had been completely soldered which means that she will surely finish this when she comes back in next week. I must say that her border choice was perfect for this since her elephant is multicolored!
Stay awesome,
Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks