Wonderful things take time and Linda F's impressive Carousel Horse shows off her stained glass abilities wonderfully. She always took her time while working on this and never allowed herself to get overwhelmed or discouraged. The end result is the largest window that Linda has ever worked on with probably the highest amount of pieces as well. Stunning through and through, this window shines.
June's Darth Vader got washed, colored and waxed after which he was ready for his closeup. It was hard to get a good picture of him because this is a window that needs a fair amount of light in front of it as well as behind it. My first few pictures just looked like black blobs because none of the detail was showing up in the camera but that changed when I turned on the flash and put a light in front of 'Darthy' as well as behind him.
Steve came in to class having to wrap and solder his Mary and Child Panel and he muscled through all of that work and walked out the door with this completed piece just three hours later. It's certainly beautiful and the best part is that it's his own design! Steve is becoming famous throughout our classes for coming up with his own designs. It's one thing to be able to make a window but designing one is so much more harder (as well as more rewarding).
Annette needed a Wedding Gift and want to personalize it somehow with the names of the Bride and Groom. We settled on a Heart Within a Heart Design and then fired the names James and Tara onto the white heart earlier in the week. By the time class was over Nettie walked out the door with the perfect gift!
Betty made this cute Penguin Suncatcher in no time at all. Her aim is get as many smaller items completed as she can since her spot in The Market is starting to look a little sparse. As for the penguin, I'm assuming it's Betty dreaming of cooler weather.
Barbara put the finishing touches on her Owl Table Decoration but still needs to get the wooden holder for it. Those things are getting harder and harder to find but Barbara believes she knows someone who can make one for her. Even though her Owl isn't in its stand yet it still looks wonderfully festive with all of it's colors and is a great pattern to make so you can thin out all of those small scraps you've been saving!
Cindy was busy finishing up her Pink Pig suncatcher, her Rabbit Suncatcher and another 3D Crystal Holder. 3D projects can be tough to assemble and let me tell you that for whatever reason, this one didn't go together quite as easily as the first one did. However, after we fidgeted with the connecting points of the squares here and there everything eventually lined up and ended up looking equally as good as her first Crystal Hanger did.
Let is starting Christmas early this year and began this Christmas Bell Window while at home. It's all cut and ground save for the background glass and she's going to foil the pieces that can be foiled and bring it back in next week to learn how to cover certain pieces completely in lead for an added effect.
Lisa has begun work on her Sugar Skull and she's gotten the lion's share of it cut out already. The trick to something this complex is to work a little at a time and then tack it in sections so that things don't shift out of position. Lisa designed this herself which makes this even more special. This is clearly taking shape and you can easily understand how wonderful this is going to look once it's finished.
Susan R has been eyeing up the idea of a Peacock for quite a while now. She found one that she liked online and we've altered the design a bit to fit inside a hoop and to omit unnecessary wire work. The hoop allows her to make a larger more elaborate suncatcher without having to worry about how to hang it securely. Susan has already begun cutting glass and is well underway on this.
Susan D has a pattern book which features geometric snowflake-like designs and she's slowly but surely working her way through the book cover to cover. These two pieces already show off her cutting skills because these haven't even been ground yet. When dealing with repeating pieces exactness is of the utmost importance and Susan has already achieved greatness here..
Betty loves her Teardrop designs and was also able to work on a beach themed teardrop this week.
Martha has begun a Sunset Window and in just one class managed to get it all cut out. She's not entirely happy with one of the colors that form the rays of the sun and rather than finishing it as is and ending up being unhappy with it she's going to replace at least one piece before moving on.
Kerry was back with us and he spent his time grinding the letters for his Swedish Chef Window. Now that his letters have both been ground and wrapped he will space them out of a sheet of glass cut to the width of his window so he can figure out what the ideal spacing will be for them.
Lara's colorful Sunburst Window got tacked together and then she cut, ground, wrapped and tacked together a wonderful light pink border for it. She was hard pressed between a blue border and this pink one but we all agreed that the pink glass matched best with all of the colors that she used in the sunburst.
Lorrie worked on her own Sunburst Window while she was at home last week and did she ever get far along on it. By the time class ended she had the front side of this soldered and most of the back as well. This window IS large enough to curve some zinc channel for and that will be curved and ready to be attached when Lorrie come back in which means that his will be a done deal.
Zoe came in and got to work by by resuming the foiling on her remaining Hexagon pieces. Once that was completed she tacked everything together and then got the final red border cut, ground and foiled as well. Zoe will surely be soldering this when she comes back in and perhaps she'll even get it completed!
After Linda F got her Carousel Horse washed and waxed she turned her talents over to this popular LSU pattern. She's already begun grinding it so this will be finished before you know it.
Cheryl is grinding all of the center letter section of her Harley-Davidson Window and is working slowly but steadily through it. You don't want to rush through stained glass letters and risk having them looking like sloppy handwriting. Each letter must be carefully formed or ll you will have is mess.
The curved top on Melissa's Tulips Window is lovely and somewhat unusual in a window but it creates a slight problem. We can't bend a brass channel because it will kink rather than curve and we can't use a zinc channel on this because the came bender can't make a curve this small. Melissa could just tap-tap around the entire window but that doesn't offer much edge protection for a piece this large. So surrounding it in lead came will be the answer. Hopefully we will have some U channel by the time Melissa returns so she can finish this off because it's already been completely soldered!
Mary Grace started cutting out another Teardrop Sunflower but after she got the flower petals cut out she wondered if she could alter the pattern and add more petals and some leaves to it. When I'm asked if a pattern can be altered the answer is always a YES. This won't be a Teardrop when it's completed but it will certainly be more elaborate and impressive in its new form.
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go. See you next week!
Paul
No comments:
Post a Comment