Well That Sounds Vaguely Ominous

Lara's Books and Flowers was a n idea from a similar design that she saw on the internet however that version was surely going to fall apart due to all of the hing points and straight lines throughout the piece.  We took the idea and 'sturdied' it up by adding flowers and repositioning books and pages somewhat leaving us with this very rugged version that Lara did excellent work on!

 

 

 

Kerry has completed his LOVE Window just in time for Valentines day to the delight of Jeanne who, I believe from the post that she made, loves this window.  People often ask how you get the word LOVE into the glass not realizing that it's simply the result of well placed lead lines. 

 

 

 

This week we get to see a new Cardinal design that Cindy made.   The key feature to this one is the extensive wire work that gets accented with little glass beads on their ends along with a looping wire that forms a heart on the breast of the bird.

 

 

Does anyone here remember good ol' Two-fer Betty? This week she's Four-fer Betty as she wrapped up the work on four Silverware Dragonflies and four Cardinals as well. Yes, I know you can only see two of each but trust me when I say that there's more that I just didn't take pictures of.

After finishing her Seagull and Sunset Window Zoe decided to make a small Duck Window.   She didn't care for the idea of the dragonfly in the upper corner of the window so Zoe is leaving that out of her finished version.  I wouldn't be surprised if she has this all cut out upon her return because she certainly got a good head start on it in just one class.

 

 

 

Barbara really made some fantastic progress as she managed to get all of the background glass and the cross ground for her uniquely shaped Cross Window. In fact, it fits together so nicely that you can't even tell that there's any water glass at all in the picture below!

 

 

Susan D was grinding away at her Texas Longhorn Skull and only has a few pieces left to go before she begins wrapping this and then finishing it off. There's some beautiful work here and I love how she's positioned the grain of the glass throughout this.  It matches up but doesn't align perfectly which is actually perfect for a window like this.   It's even given me an idea for a pattern that I hope to make in the months to come.

 

 

 

Cindy has begun work in earnest on her Fancy Fleur De Lis. Whether this ends up as a stand alone hanging or a window will be interesting to see. If she chooses a stand alone hanging then the straight line across the 'band' of the Fleur De Lis will need to be addressed or else this will surely split into two pieces. As a window though, well it will be completely solid.  If she chooses the stand alone version  I believe I've come up with a simple elegant solution to handle the situation.

 

  

 

June is a beast! Her Multi-Colored Elephant has been completely ground and it looks GRRRRREAT!  The eyes still have to be cut but in all honestly they are are simple enough to be left out and added as an afterthought (as well as the tusks). That said, I have no doubt that they will be filled in when we see this again.

  

 

 

With the first of her two Flowerpot Ornaments all soldered and ready for staking, Susan R will be ready to take this home when she returns to grace one of her flower pots.   And do you see that 'pile' of glass on the upper right of the picture?  That's her second ornament all foiled and ready to be soldered.

 

  

 

As I edited Linda's Mickey picture last week I noticed that Mickey's face had been cut out of white glass which made him look more than a little ashy.   I figured I'd say something to her when she returned to class but before that happened Linda texted me and asked why I didn't tell her that Mickey looked like a ghost! Now I have to say that sometimes things slip by me in person but then they become apparent when I edit the pictures that I take each week.   That said, I'm glad that Linda discovered the problem on her own and when she came back in I saw that she had already re-cut and ground Mickey's face.   Now that he's been tacked together Linda is ready to cut out her background!

 

 

 

I know that it's hard to see in the small picture here but if you click on it you can see the first sheet of glass that MiMi traced the background pieces for her lamp on.  There's another sheet of glass about half this size with even more pieces traced upon it and I will bet dollars to doughnuts that MiMi will be cutting a lot of tiny BG pieces upon her return!

 

Judy's Carousel Horse is almost completely ground and she's following a very important stained glass rule:  Never grind the background glass until the subject has been ground first.   And that's just what Judy did here.  The bright green background will be cut AFTER she tacks this together with solder.

 

  

 

 

The Cross in Ann's Cross Window is a bit obscured by her background pieces but you can see that she's making excellent progress grinding her BG pieces starting with the right hand side. As the background gets ground more and more of the cross will be revealed until this is ready to be foiled.

 

There's an interesting story that belongs to Linda F's Flower Of Life Window this week. She came in needed a border and after we cut the strips we discovered that something was VERY wrong with her window because the measurement across the top was larger than the bottom measurement by a whopping half inch! It seems that when I drew this for her I somehow mis-marked a measurement. Luckily we managed to fix it by grinding the difference off of the angled panel and then swapping that center panel to the end.  By the time Linda left we had fixed the issue as well as added the perfect border to this.  And that goes to show you that even perfect Paul can make a mistake. Very rarely though-- very, VERY rarely! 😊

 

 

 

Shelley's Cat Window is coming together and now that Toot's eyes have mostly been cut out she'll be able to correctly position them and cut them into place. I always make eyes separately and then tack them into position because it prevents grinding errors from making the subject cross eyed.

 

  

 

Week by week, piece by piece Sheri gets a little closer to the end of her large Koi Fish Window.  She's still not sure what color the heads of these fish will be but she's carefully considering that problem as she works on the sections that she IS sure about.

 

  

 

 

Let was so very close to completing her Stained Glass Clock that it was it was a bit upsetting to NOT get a finished picture of it. When class was over all she had left to do was to wash and color it after which she'd attach the clock work to the back. She has send me a picture of the clock face after she washed and colored it at home but I didn't want to share that with you this week only because I want you all to be amazed at just how lovely this finished piece is when we return next week.

 

 

 

 

Lorrie's baby elephant in her 'Sugar' Elephant Window is coming together quickly.  She's adopted the Grind-As-You-Cut approach and when you cut this perfectly I never complain about that.  She may very well go back to her Under Water Scene next week now that the glass for her water has arrived so it may be a few weeks before we see the baby elephant gets his head attached.

 

  

 

With the front side of her second Corner Accent Soldered there is no doubt that Kandise will have this completed when she leaves next week.  Once the soldering on the back side gets done she'll get some hooks on this, wash it all up, color it. 

  

 

With essentially only fill-in's and the rose in the center of the cross left to cut, Bee is fast approaching her endgame on this piece. It's been a labor of love all the way through and the love is going to be thoroughly apparent in the end result.  This will be a tribute window made with love.

 

  

 

Lastly we look at Cheryl's Harley Davidson Window. She's got most of the MOTOR section ground now but will need to cut out the center of one of the 'O's that apparently got lost in the shuffle. It won't be long until Cheryl moves on down to the word CYCLES after which the rest of this window will be easy curves with a few straight lines.

 

 

And there you have it!

 

Toodles!

 

Paul

Bayou Salé GlassWorks