I'm Bringing Home A Baby Bumble Bee

Well now, look at this. Within 2 classes Bonnie has finished her first project. She's made this Wedding Plaque as a present and she got it completed just in time for the wedding. This pattern had some nice inner curves for Bonnie to practice on including the top piece of the background glass. Had that broken while we were cutting it the grain of the background would never have lined up as perfectly as it does now. Bonnie's next project will be Ballerina Slippers.

Pam is our newest student and that mean we have a butterfly to look at this week. She used a bluish/purple glass for her wings and a lavender body with swirled purple head. Pam did extremely well during her first class and I can't wait to see what she plans on making next.
Look! All the bees and the hive that Roxie cut out last week are ground and ready to be wrapped. She's moving right along on this and next she'll be tacking and soldering these together. This is another project that is moving along REALLY quickly. In fact I say this will easily be finished within 2 weeks.

Sonia now has all of her Sunflower window cut out and half of it ground and fitted together. She's taken home her ground pieces so she can wrap them and then she'll really be on her way to finishing this. The background glass will just take a few minutes to cut and only a few more to grind.
Well, Terry's window certainly is impressive. What you see here is all tacked together which means that there are only the four corners left to cut and attach to this before she starts soldering. And as I'm typing this I just realized that at this point one of the corners IS already cut and at home with Terry to be wrapped.

Myrt is also moving along at a very brisk pace with her Butterfly window. This is much more complex than the butterfly that she made during her first class. This window is all ground and next week it will tacked together and ready for a quick border and some solder.

Fran's Ducks window is so close to being complete I can just about see them hanging in a window. Everything is tacked together and it all looks good so the border was attached and the brass channel was added to square it all off. Fran will be soldering this window at home during the week and will then wash and color it next week here in class. Look for the finished version then!

Niblet Corn? That's what it looks like now but when these pieces are ground and fitted together you'll see that Patty has made her corn ON the cob. I have to say that these pieces are NOT fun to cut or keep track of-- they all look the same until you mix them up and then they'll never fit back together. That's why you see numbers on these pieces. Most times we don't bother with numbers because they can cause as many problems as they help prevent, but in this particular instance we're resorting to numbers. And after each piece is ground the number will be rewritten on the piece so we don't lose track of where we stand.
Well now, this Boar head window is coming together! Cindy has decided that it's a bit too plain so she's added grass to the background which will add considerably to the amount of work in this project but as I always say, the more work you put into a window the more impressive it will be when it's completed. When it comes to stained glass any extra work you put into a window comes back in spades when it's completed. And Cindy and Patty's windows are prime examples of this.

And Anita nears completion on her Egret window. All the pieces are in place, the border is attached and the channel is on. That means that Anita will be doing some soldering to finish up this window. And Anita isn't afraid of it so it's going home with her to get that solder on it before she comes in next week.

Ok, we're only 1 class away from being up to date here. Here's hoping I can keep up with the weekly classes and keep this Blog from falling behind again.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Personal Pictures Taken Also

Ok, as soon as I start catching up I slack off here and fall behind with our Blog posts. That means that this will be another multiple post week (hopefully 3 of them which will then bring us up to date). I do know that a second one will be posted tomorrow so we're well on our way. Now let's see what happened 3 weeks ago in the shop.

Grace has completed her Aeroscope Kaleidoscope and it certainly is colorful. She went ahead and took her time making the much more elaborate propeller color wheel for the front of it and it really does make it look like a real bi-plane. This is another job well done by Grace.

I took picture after picture trying to get a good view of the inside of Grace's Kaleidoscope but this best shot was provided by Grace herself who came up with the solution to taking these kinds of pictures. As for what the secret is, well, I'll never tell. Grace also takes Facebook profile pics and 'personal' pictures for a nominal fee. :-)

Roxie is making something completely different. It's a stained glass Mobile of 3 Honey Bee's flying under their Bee Hive. She has everything cut and ready to be ground when we see her next. There are one or two issues I have with the pattern but I think I know what we'll do to make this much sturdier than the original blueprints would end up having this.


Here's Patty's Seafood Medley Window (meow!) She's got one of the crabs completed and will be taking this window a little at a time. Slow and steady wins the race (and it stops you from pulling out your hair).

Meanwhile Janice completed wrapping all of her flowers. Next up for her will be cutting and attaching all of the leaves. Then she'll be ready for cutting out her backgrounds.

Bonnie has begun making a wedding plaque with interlocking rings as the side panel. She's not wasting any time at all since she has the rings cut, wrapped and tacked together. The background is also cut and ground to fit so that means when she comes back in she'll be adding the borders and soldering this project.
And we're going to finish off this post with a look at Sonia's Sunflower with Birds window. When we last saw this only the yellow sunflower petals were cut out. Now she's only got bird feathers and her background to go!
As I said, we're falling a bit behind so expect another posting tomorrow. This will get us almost up to date again. A lot of our projects that you are just looking at here are already completed. So come back when you get our update notice!

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Cutting Corners

Since we took most of Easter week off we only had a handful of students come in. That doesn't mean that nothing was accomplished though as you will soon see.

Since the Oil Scopes are such a big hit Russ and I decided to try something a little different and go for one of the other OilWand kits. This one is called "The Lost Planet" and I have to say that I really like the idea of the LARGE opening used to view the image (as you can see, the camera takes a great picture of the image) but it does require more light than the regular Oil Scope. At any rate, here's what "The Lost World" looks like from the outside.


And these are 2 shots of what you see when you look into the bottom viewfinder. Remember, you only see one of these images at a time but it's constantly 'exploding' which is why I've included 2 different views.


Cindy has cut out most of her Boar Window and has begun grinding it. She's decided to spruce up the background a bit with a lot of green grass which really will add to the look of this window. Here's a shot of some of Cindy's cutting. All those scalloped edges means that the small grinding wheel and Cindy will become good friends!

Terry's made some big progress on her Beveled window. She has almost all of the bevels cut and will begin adding the final border when she returns. I know this is hard to see right now but in just a few more weeks this is going to knock your socks off!

Anita hasn't been sitting around twiddling her thumbs either. Look how far her Egret Window has come along. A lot of this had been ground and there's really only the sky left to cut before she begins tacking this window. And once you start tacking the rest is child's play.

Grace is moving right along with her Aeroscope. She's be finished with this one next week for sure since all she needs to do now is solder her color wheel (the propeller) and then make another out of clear textured glass. This project is going to fly right out the door.

And Janice has finished the last of her flowers for her 3 large windows. She's going to wrap these and then tack them together before adding the green Leaves. Once that's done she'll be cutting background!

That was what happened during the week before Easter. We had another small class the following week but now things are back into gear and moving right along. Check out a new finished project in our next post. Can you guess which one it will be?

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

Ducks In The Wind

I close my eyes, Only for a moment and the moment's gone. All my dreams, pass before my eyes a curiosity. Ducks in the wind. All we are are ducks in the wind.

Look at the very stylish and tasteful beveled box that Roxie made this week. There's no doubt that she has the hang of making these. And the great thing is that these boxes make GREAT Christmas presents. So if you're reading this blog and you know Roxie be sure to drop a int or two her way about getting one on December 25th (which will be here quicker than you think).


We had 2 new students begin classes this week. Cindy is a friend of Terry's and she made this green and yellow butterfly without a single problem at all. We've been on a roll with our students lately as no one has been having any problems. Cindy will be starting a Boar Window next week (you heard us right-- Cindy will be making our first ever Boar window!) I dare you to tell me that this isn't going to be interesting....

Bonnie is the second of our new students and this is her Butterfly. She went with the color purple and like Cindy had no problems doing any part of the stained glass process. She still isn't sure what she'll be making for her project but I know she's going to do just fine.


Next we take a look at the newest incarnation of Frans Ducks in the wind Window. As you can see the water and ducks themselves have been tacked together and it's just the new re-cut blue sky that needs to be ground and wrapped. We did a good job matching the new duck to the outline of the old one because the water just fell into place around it even though it had been ground to the old duck. Fran will most likely make a smaller window using the other duck.

Grace has gone all out with color on her newest Aeroscope. The outside is just as colorful as the inside will be. She's gone about as far as she can with this because we didn't have a kit in stock. We have the pattern and an axel kit but not the brass rods that anchor the wings together. That will happen next week.

Here we see one half of Terry's Beveled window cut and ground. It's starting to come together now and you'll see big strides on this next week (if I can fit the entire window into the camera frame!) There are just 2 pieces of glass left to cut on this and then the outside border.

Myrt went cutter crazy and cut out most of her latest window in one night. There are just a few pieces left in her butterfly to fill in and then she'll be working on the grinder. I guess I'm going to have to start putting tons of tiny pieces into her patterns to slow her down. LOL


Speaking of tons of small pieces....Here's a look at Patty's latest project. Yes, it can be very intimidating to look at but when you work on it a section at a time you start to see that projects like this aren't nearly as bad as you might initially think they are. And you can mark my words when I state for the record that this is going to be stunning when it's completed in 3 years. Actually I'm just checking to see if anyone is reading this far down! This window will be done quickly enough. Just wait and see.

Two new students this week means that things are really picking up in classes. We're overstocked with students and the projects are just flying out the door.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks

I'munna make some glass

Well, here's a look at Graces completed Wedding Plaque. She purchased a heavy, black metal easel to display the stained glass that she's made and it does so very securely. The end result was even better than she anticipated because she hadn't even noticed the intertwined hearts on the top of the invitation which match the hearts in the lower stained glass panel. When it came time to decide if she should color the lead black or copper she decided to leave it silver to match the text and trim of the invitation. All in all it's another job very well done.


Meanwhile Patty was hard at work this week making herself another beveled box. She made this in one class so I'd say she's really hit her stride with these. She's using striking pieces of colored glass for the tops of these boxes which really set them off. Here's a look at the box both closed and with the lid slightly ajar.

And this week we get to see that Myrt has finished her Bumble Bee window. Like Anita, Myrt has decided to help Ceil out by completing a window for her classroom. Myrt really did 99% this window on her own so I think it's safe to say that she's got the stained glass thing down pat now. And you've gotta love that bee!

The final completed project this week was a pair of beveled boxes by Roxie. Like Patty, Roxie did all the work by herself using me only as a sounding board to be sure that what she was going to do next was the correct step. As you can tell from the picture below she did just fine. These boxes are always attention getters and once you know the secret to making them. But what really makes these particular boxes is the precision of the work that Roxie put forth in putting them together. Sure, anyone can make a box but not many people can make a box fit together so perfectly.

Sonia has decided to start making a Sunflower window complete with 2 birds. It's a nice size project with a fair number of pieces so this should be a project that teaches Sonia a lot. And I have to say that her flower petals are already fitting together nicely even before they've even been ground.

Janice is our reining Flower girl. For the past few weeks she's been working on flowers in sets of 3 and has been doing a great job assembling them. Wait until you see these windows once the backgrounds get cut-- they're going to be colorful, flowing and spectacular when they're installed.

Here's a look at the replacement duck that Fran made this week. It's all ground and tacked together save for one piece that she plans to re-cut and have ready next week. Forgive the hole in this ducks back because it will be fixed the next time you see it.

And now we get to see what Terry has begun working on. It's actually 1 of a set of 3 but the other two won't be identical to this one. Terry is going with Bevels and clear glass for all three but this is the biggest and the most difficult of the 3. There's no doubt at all that it will be striking when it's finished. And the nice thing is that once the corners are put together the rest of this should move VERY quickly. That's the benefit of working with bevels.

We have another Blog post coming up tomorrow so be ready for another update Tuesday morning.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks