Dancing Night At Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Gerald came back this week with a ton of pictures from the cruise he and his family went on. Pictures were flying, stories were told, Cheryl turned up the music that was playing and the next thing we knew Mary Lynn was dancing! (But not with us!)

Cheryl came in with both sides of her Sun/Wind/Moon window soldered and then cut out the deep blue eyes and red lips for the Sun and the Moon. When that was finished Russ bent some zinc channel to fit around her circular window and then we gave it a bath. When we finished washing it this is what Cheryl ended up with. I knew I was going to like this one a lot. Notice how none of her straight lines waver. Also, her curves are all graceful (on her window!!!) Great job Cheryl. I won't tell you what she has in mind next so come back next week to see what's on her mind. Great job, Cheryl!

This is another window I couldn't wait to see completed. Sheila's 2nd large window has come out looking just as I suspected it would: perfect. Although it's hard to see, her border is a clear iridescent that reflects purple, green and pink when the sunlight hits it. It's the perfect compliment to the colors she has in the flower and leaves. Sheila has her next 4 projects all lined up-- 4 cabinet door inserts. Look here next week to see what pattern she's decided on.

Ann began working on her first real stained glass window this week. With her pattern drawn up she traced it out onto glass and got all but her backgrounds cut. It amazed me how quickly she got through all this work and as you can see her cutting is very precise. She'll grind this when we see her again and I suspect she'll get it all ground at the rate she's going.

Grace was unsure of what she was going to do but when she saw this Fleur De Lis pattern hanging on the wall she decided that it was something she wanted to make. I'm not sure what happened but her cutting and grinding this week was nothing short of superb! Not that there was anything wrong with it before, but the speed at which she cut and ground this really floored me. And look how smooth her curves are, I couldn't have cut this any better myself.

Janice got the center bevels all cut, ground, wrapped, and tacked together on her last Fleur De Lis Window. She's really gotten the hang of wrapping the thick sections of the cut bevels! Here's a picture of one of the bevels that she had to fit in place.

And this is the left side of her window. She did the beveled border on all four sides so she's on the last lap of the track now!

Jane began wrapping her window while she was in class because it's too complex to disassemble and wrap at home. But she's moving quickly through it and I suspect she'll begin tacking this together next week. She did take all of the clear squares that weren't cut in half home with her (they're all interchangeable and it won't matter where they go in the window) so there are a number of pieces missing in the picture below. Still, you can really make out the weaving pattern of the lattice work and see the vines that run through connecting all the flowers and leaves.


And holding down the rear of our projects this week is Gerald's piece of tail. :-) This was the last of his 4 piece Tiger set and we'll have a picture of the 4 windows installed soon. I've only just realized that I have no clue what Gerald will be working on next. I guess it will be a surprise for all of us next week.

I guess that's about it until next week. We'll see you all then.

Paul
Bayou Sale GlassWorks

Late, Late, Late!

This is the latest that this Blog has ever been updated. We've had a morning class already for the following week and I'm just finally getting around to writing up what happened last week! I place full blame on our internet outage and possibly some poor work ethics due to some distractions made by a new video game or two...It won't happen again. :-)

Let's start things off with a look at the Fruit Window that Mary Lynn made this week. Her work was flawless and her soldering required hardly any touch ups at all. In fact, I'd say that Mary Lynn handled a good 99% of this window herself. And results like this certainly make her teachers look good, don't they? :-)

This is a look at one of the 2 Butterflies that were made this week. This was done by Ann who seems to be a natural at the whole stained glass thing. Ann will be working on a Humming Bird window next.

Sheila is all ready to solder her Orchid Window! With everything all cut I suspect this will be completed not during her next class, but the one after. I can't wait until you see how the iridescent border looks when it's held up in the light. This one is bound to be spectacular.


Craig finished his Fleur De Lis window at home and sent me this picture. My final words of advice to Craig (before he took this to solder at home) were "Remember that when you solder, slower is faster". He said he did his best to work at a steady, even pace and he had no problems at all. You can rush through soldering and have to redo it 3 or 4 times to get it to look decent but the best thing is to move slow and steady through it the first time. Remelting solder is a strain on your Soldering Iron and it really slows you down. DO it correctly the first time and you'll ALWAYS come out ahead.

Darlene was the second of 2 new students this week and she managed to make this nice bright butterfly during her first class. She's unsure what she'll be making next-- Perhaps a Mickey Mouse window or a Wizard. She's going to be away during the next 3 weeks so she has plenty of time to think about it!

Jane's window has been getting a lot of attention during the last 2 weeks. She's got it all cut out now and every leave and flower has been cut into the trellis. It's hard to see a difference from last weeks picture but all her glass is now cut and she'll be wrapping this next week.

Barbara's back and she's just about finished her humming bird window. In fact, the front is almost completely soldered and all she needs to do is flip it around and get the back side. After that we'll add 2 hooks, wash this off and then call it finished! This pattern came from a Faux Stained Glass Window that she had. We altered it a bit by adding more curves and I have to say that it looks so much better than the fake one. :-) And the work that Barabra did is so much better as well!

Christine has the first of her Indian Windows almost complete. The front side of this is soldered and there's only the back side to go before we call this finished. She reduced the size of this from the orginal pattern and had to deal with a lot of tiny pieces but she did it! Christine has come a long way since she first wlked in the door here.


Janice and Grace worked together as a team this week on their last Fleur De Lis Window. An incrdible amount of progress was made by the two of them as you can see by the picture below. All of this is tacked together and all that we need to do next is add the center bevel border and then the final glue chip border. They'll be soldering this one real soon now!

And last, but certainly not least, we have Lea's Diamond Bevel china cabinet windows. She's got one complete set of bevels trimmed in an off-green glass and is working on the second set now. With the bevels all wrapped and tacked together I'm guessing that we might cut into the background glass as soon as next week! You can really see what a difference bordering the bevels in a light color does.


It feels strange to post this today because I already have news to type up about what happened this morning during class. I'm sorry about the delay in getting this out and I'll try to make sure that it doesn't happen again.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Where's Barbara??

No one has heard from Barbara this week so we're hoping that the 'getaway time' she took with her husband last week turned into a getaway vacation. :-)

As we predicted in our last post Janice has completed the second of her three Fleur De Lis windows. This one is a little different from the first one that she did but there is a common theme running between them which makes them match. Janice is working on a second window to match this one and act as bookends to the first slightly fancier window that she made.


Wasting no time at all Janice got Grace to help out with the corners for her next window. They were both jumping around helping out here and there until the large window was completed and most of the corners and the center Fleur De Lis was finished for the last window. It looks like we'll be cutting out the background next week for these.


Lea began working on 2 long china cabinet doors. She's going with a diamond bevel theme bordered in a light color. There will be 2 large bevel sets in the center of these windows and then a smaller diamond bevel will sit on the top and bottom of the larger ones. Here are her first 2 larger clusters all tacked together.
Sheila got most of the background cut for her window and we got to see what it looks like held up in the air and off the table. As you may (or may not) know, I never show a window with light behind it until that window is finished. I hate to give away too much before the project is completed but rest assured that this one is going to be well worth the wait. Sheila has picked a heavily textured clear glass for her background that's hard to see in the small picture below so make sure you click on it to see the larger view. We'll have a border on this next week for sure.

Mary Lynn got her background all cut out and then moved along to her thing colored border. After that was all wrapped and tacked together we got her last border all cut out so she could take it home with her and do what she can with it there. This is a classy looking window! We tried to play a trick on her when she was out last week but she was too smart for us and didn't bite. Look how nicely everything fits together here.


Cheryl has managed to finish with almost all of her cutting and grinding. With only eyeballs and lips left to go I'd say that she is on the home stretch with this window. This was a big project and Cheryl made short work of it by working quickly and efficiently though it. All her lines flow gracefully and her straight lines all line up. I don't see how anyone could have done a better job on this . Cheryl will be soldering this before you know it. I'm not sure of this will be getting a border or not but I'll find out for sure next week when Cheryl returns.


Craig was in again this week to get some bevels to finish off his final border for his own Fleur De Lis window. Blue jewels and a deep blue Fleur De Lis rest inside all clear glasses which make this window sparkle wonderfully. I just got word that he's finished soldering this and that he took my advice and moved slowly while soldering to avoid having to remelt his lines. He says he agrees with me now and understands what I mean when I say that the slower you solder the faster your window will be completed. It's far easier to get the solder correct the first time than it is to try to remelt it to fix the mistakes that are made when you move too fast to try and rush a job out the door.

Jane got all of the clear center pieces of her Trellis Window cut and ground so she then laid out all her flowers and leaves on top of her gridwork design and began to cut them into place. It's difficult to tell from the picture but half of the flowers have been cut into place while the others are just resting on top of the glass waiting to be traced out ind inserted into this pattern. Jane will be wrapping this soon enough not to mention soldering it.


Gerald is gone away on his cruise this week and we hope stained glass is a million miles away from his mind as he enjoys his vacation with his family. We all missed him here in class though. And I can't end this without saying a big "Thank You" to Janice and Grace for bringing me a birthday cake this week. I feel sorry for anyone who didn't get a piece of this cake! Thanks!

We have 2 new students starting next week so be prepared for 2 butterflies.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

A Quiet Week

It was a slow week here at the shop in terms of classes, but we do have a lot of progress to report.

Sheila made a lot of headway on her window. Not only did she get her flowers and leaves cut but she has everything ground and ready to wrap. She's taken it home with her so she can wrap everything before she comes back into class next week. She used Stipple glass for her flower petals and the colors are incredible. This is going to light up spectacularly.


Janice continued soldering her 2nd Fleur De Lis Window and has this one pretty much under control now. It will be going home with her next week for sure so expect to see a picture of it completed next week.

Grace didn't have anything picked out yet to work on for herself so she cut out the four corner clusters for her mother's next (and final) Fleur De Lis window. She ground one of the corners and took the other three home to finish there. I suspect that this 3rd window will pretty much fly together for Janice. Here's a look at one of the ground corner sections that Grace finished.


Jane began working on her Trellis Window while she was at home and came in with her flowers all cut, ground, wrapped and tacked together. The hard part (or so she thought) was cutting the actual trellis and getting it to line up nicely. Luckily the strip cutter made short work of that and as you can see the only thing left to do is trim all the edge pieces. Next week she'll cut the clear glass squares that drop in between the trellis.


Although I didn't get a picture of the flowers that Jane will inset into the trellis, I did snap a quick picture of the pattern to give you a rough idea of what she's going for. The flowers are a nice purple color with nice deep green leaves. Once all the trellis is ground and laid out Jane will arrange her flowers and leaves on top of it, trace them and cut them into place. This insures a nice fit and keeps her lines all straight.

Sadly, it was a quiet week here. We had decided to let the students help themselves to all the scrap glass we had cut over the years and from the set of windows we did for the Baton Rogue job. It's all gone now but I'm sure we'll have more to offer in the future.

In the shop we're finishing up the two large curved windows that we've been working on. Expect to see them delivered shortly.

See you all next week.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks