Jump Around A Bit

I've found that many, many people orientate their patterns to the poster board that they will trace it onto without even thinking about trying to turn it the other direction.  Students also tend to center their pattern as well which results in MUCH wasted poster board.  This we know by looking at the pile of scrap poster board that we have in the shop.  Although the placement of the pattern below is completely serviceable, it's also VERY wasteful.

 

Here we've rotated the pattern and, as you can see, it easily fits in this direction while saving a large section of poster board for other projects.  In fact, you can easily fit three of these patterns on just one piece of card stock.

 

It may sound as though I'm being overly thrifty but why pay $1.00 for one copy when you can get 3 for a dollar, right?


So first up we have Mary Grace's beautiful and elegant 'B' Window.   Pay particular attention to how each of the curves lines up perfectly throughout the entire design.  that's called attention to detail.  Mary Grace asked me if it would be possible to do the same design with the letter 'A' replacing the 'B' so we may very well see a similar window made in the near future.

 

Martha's Oval Daylily looks fantastic and she easily avoided the possible pitfalls of this design.   Oval windows can't get a channel around them and have a tendency to 'sink inward'  at the joints that come to the edge of the window.  normally channel covers these gaps but when you can't apply channel to the window those spots become glaringly obvious. Martha's outer edge doesn't do that at all.  And 's not only that-- her soldering  was aces as well!

 

Then we have Susan R who put the final touches on her Mardi Gras Mask this week.  I must say that the colors and the workmanship on this are very impressive indeed.  There are a lot of small, thin pieces in this and Susan handled then all with aplomb.

 

Linda F managed to completed not one but two projects this week.  Her Quilt Square Panel is perfection indeed.  Look at how all of her straight lines line up together and you'll realize just how talented  an artist she is.   Then there's her Christmas Bulbs Panel which is just as impressive and utilizes lead covered glass.   It's an interesting technique for sure and one you don't see done very often at all.

 

Angie's Beveled Horse Window is all tacked together and the front side of this has even been soldered already.   Although it looks brown, all of the horse and the border is made out of clear bevels.  It's just the color of the work table that you see which is making it look brown.  I have no doubt at all that this is going to be completed when she comes back in. and once back-lit it will sparkle beautifully.

 

Beth's second project is very revealing to the fact that Beth totally gets it.   Stained glass that is.   Although she's still 'new' at this art she's already showing a retention of various techniques that impresses me.  Just look at how nicely her Address Window is moving along.  She not only tacked together the upper tree portion of the window this week-- she also cut AND ground the letter and numbers!   Color me impressed.

Rowena came into class with almost all of this beautiful Magnolia Window cut out.  She immediately set to work on cutting out her background pieces and then took it all over to the grinder where she then finished grinding her entire window.  That's fast work!  Once it was ground she pondered what she would do for an inside border and looking at the one piece of yellow almost dead center in the middle of the flower gave us an idea.   We found a subtle piece of yellow glass that went perfectly with the flower and you can easily see how wonderful this is looking already.

 

Tracey's Cardinal window is looking MUCH better than the pattern would have you believe.   The pattern itself has been' through the ringer' to say the least but now that the glass that Tracey cut is covering a lot of it we're starting to see the true beauty of this window.  Now that everything has been cut Tracey is free to begin grinding.

 

Here's another window that just looks better and better with each passing week.   Lara's Indian Headdress is so very close to being completely cut out.  With just four leaves left to go and a few background pieces I'm guessing that it won't be long before this is hanging in a window.

 

Susan D is back in action and as you can see, although she's been G.I.A. (Grandmother In Action) for the past 6 or 7 weeks, she's still managed to get work completed while she was at home in her limited free time.  She's tweaked a Peacock Pattern to her liking and as of this week she's got the majority of it cut out.  We'll be doing the background to this after the peacock itself is tacked together and then we will work out the fancy headdress that needs some minor changes to make work.

 

MiMi's Bull Window is also taking shape and she only has 2 pieces of glass left to grind before she can start wrapping this.  She's learning quickly and fully grasps how to skim new pieces and then place pieces that we've already ground on top of the new piece to trace around and get a perfect fit.  This is looking great!

  

 

Sheri's Tabasco Oysters Window is completely recognizable now that she has the letters for the text cut out.  And ANYONE can see that she has a bottle of Tabasco sauce standing in the center of it all.  This is really looking good and making me hungry for Oysters!

  

Geometrics are in and Terry's Window is just all cut save for the last border.   With the center section all tacked together she managed to get the first uneven border cut and ready to skim and wrap.  Next week we'll see the final border get attached for sure (since she already has the strips cut.)

 

 

Although you can't see it, Mary got the center round section of her Dream Catcher Window  all cut out.  Since this section is all about the lead lines forming a string that wraps and entwines throughout the circle we want to be extremely sure that everything lines up perfectly within it.  She's already begun grinding as you can tell by the dark circle border pieces. I think this is going to to be another standout Indian Window.

  

 

Melissa cut out the 8 small Fleur De Lis' that surround her geometric design and you can really get a feel for this window now that they are sitting on the pattern.   She'll grind these and then tack them together to prevent things from shifting. Once that's done she'll cut her final background.   I love Melissa's attention to detail because it makes for a flawless window.

  

 

With the center section all cut out and tacked together Jan has only 8 more pieces of glass to go before she's finished cutting.  She's created a 'dummy' piece to take the place of the curved plate because if she tacked the plate on now the window wouldn't lay flat on the table.  You could always use cardboard to build up the edges but our method is a far more efficient way to handle the situation.  Once the window is together and the front is soldered we will replace the dummy piece (which has NOT been tacked in) with the actual plate.  Easy peasy!

 

Becky S has the zinc channel attached to her Peacock Window and the front side has already been completely soldered.   With just the back side to go I'm thinking that this will SURELY be completed upon her arrival to class on Thursday.  Wait until you see this lit up!

 

A few weeks ago Betty saw Melissa's Sunflower Window and fell in love with it so she took the pattern home last week and came back in with only a few pieces left to be ground.  You can't see all of the yellow headed pins she's used to hold this together because they blend in with the yellow sunflower glass but trust me, they're there.  I'm impressed at how much Betty accomplished in such a short time.

Brenda got the first of her pair of Transom Windows tacked together and this one will get it's final border when she comes back in.  Once that's done she can either solder this or move on to putting together her second transom window.

 

Barbara H finished grinding her Tulip Window while she was at home and managed to get it all tacked together here in the shop.   There are a few missing pieces that need to be re-cut (with a project of this magnitude that's not unusual at all) but we are going to re-cut them after Barbara gets her borders attached so we can position glass under her tacked piece.  This will give us a perfect fit and deal with any slight variations she's made from the pattern.

As you may recall, Becky S was working on a Peacock window this week but she also worked on 36 'reward' medallions for a local Pickleball Playoff.  She got all 216 pieces cut for the background of the medallions which you can see all stacked up in the box next to the 172 globs that she wrapped which are in the bag!  Now THAT'S a lot of work!

 

Linda L is about to start working on this beautiful geometric design that she found  on the internet.   Since it's a geometric design the first thing we looked for are repeats in the pattern.  This has two repeats-- one on the left and the second on the right.  All Linda needs to do is trace out half of her pattern and cut two of everything-- one forward and one backward.   Doing it this way ensures a much more 'even' and symmetrical window.

 

Lastly, we have Carol who completed two Easter Rabbit Lawn Ornaments.   I didn't get a shot of them because she left so quickly but I'm sure you get the picture.  Or do you????  Never create and run before Paul's camera goes off.  lol

And there you have it.  All that's fit to print for the 3rd week of February.

Paul
Bayou Salé GlassWorks