Never a Dull Moment
Ellen came in knowing that she would have some soldering to do on her window this week. While she worked on the back side of it Jane and I were contemplating the best way to finish off her window. And once that was done we concentrated on drawing up Ellen’s next pattern. Still, we managed to get Ellen’s Wrought Iron Window completed and we have a great picture of it. The deep blue Bullseye glass stands out nicely against the clear glass background and the thick black lead lines. The black sections in the center panel are all lead (not black glass) and really give this window a great look. Once again we have another great window from Ellen.
Chris visited us from Texas for a few days and spent roughly 10 hours making a window which denotes his profession. Apparently no one calls him by his name so he answers to the name “Coach†which is the subject of his first stained glass window. As you can see from his finished project he didn’t have any problems working with glass at all. The letters are actually done in purple waterglass but look much darker in the picture because we had to shut off the light behind it to get the picture to come out without a huge glare behind it. Dark letters or not, it looks great. Good job, Chris!
Jane worked on finishing her Moose Window this week. She only needed to add a border to it and then the word MOOSE somewhere on the border. My original idea was to us etching cream to etch the letters into the glass but it didn’t stand out enough to actually see the writing unless you were right on top of it. Then Jane suggested using wires to form letters. She said this while I was looking at Ellen’s window which then gave me an idea. We cut the letters out of copper foil and then applied them to the border attaching the top to the lead line and the bottom to the brass channel that surrounds the outside of the window. Once it was firmly attached we put solder over the foil and had letters that stand out nicely against the border. I’m just glad to had an exacto-knife around or cutting these letters out would have been impossible. Jane needs to solder the back of the border pieces and then color this window to finish it off.
Fran finished wrapping her Rooster and then tacked it together. She spent the rest of the class soldering the front side of it. This will be finished during her next class without a doubt so be sure to come back next week to see what it looks like finished and hanging with some light behind it. Fran has ordered a grinder so she can start doing more work at home while she’s not here in class. She’ll be working on a seafood window next. Look for the finished Rooster and a look at her newest pattern next week.
Janice continued grinding her Iris window. There’s not much to say here about it this week but next week we’ll most certainly have her wrapping her finished pieces. That’s when the picture will really give you a feel for what the window will look like.
Meanwhile, Grace went to work on her first window. She traced out her pattern and then did exactly what I told her to do and put the grain lines and color markings on the original drawing rather than the heavy paper pattern that we cut up and trace out onto the glass. Luckily I realized that I had her label the wrong pattern before she cut it up which made it a little easier to fix the mistake I had her make. 
But together we were able to fix the problem within a few minutes and then Grace moved on to cutting out the lower ‘Letter’ portion of her window. It looks like she’ll have only 4 pieces left to cut out next week before we get her grinding the bottom part of her window.
On the second grinder we had Mary Lynn arduously working away getting her Oval Iris Window to fit together perfectly. She’s got a good portion of it finished and I expect well see her wrapping pieces next week so we can tack this together and get the final border on. This window is looking good!
The Address Window that Joey had finished last week is now hanging in the front window of Cheryl and Joey’s house and was noticed by by just about all our students who drive past it on their way to class. We heard nothing but compliments from everyone who saw it. :-) With that project finished Joey has begun working on 8 cabinet doors for their kitchen. He’s cutting them all out at the same time rather than doing them one at a time because it’s ultimately fast to do it that way and you also manage to use less glass when you cut them all out at once. Although the picture below looks as though only 11 pieces of glass are cut, there’s plenty more than that because the pieces are stacked 5 high. Joey is using the pistol grip cutter for all of this project and he’s already got the hang of it. We’ll see some clear glass cut for these windows next week.
Cheryl continued working on her Balloons while she was in. She has 2 completed, one halfway wrapped and a forth one all cut and ground. That leaves only one left to go before she starts cutting the easy part of the window. Since the last balloon has only 16 pieces in it I’d say that she’s got the hardest part of the window finished already. Her larger balloons have 61, 81, and 63 pieces in them!
Our second husband and wife team are showing us how fast 2 people can get one large window finished. Tiffany and Jimmie finished cutting out all of their background glass and then moved on to grinding it. They have about a forth of it ground already as you can see in the picture below. They’re moving quickly and I’m sure we’ll see the name section of the window ground to fit next week.
Gerald began working on the lower left section of his window while he was in. He has the All but one Iris cut and ground. He’s using all art glass in this project and you can see the difference in the flower petals even in the picture below. Gerald will be in Texas next week so we won’t see any progress during our next class, but we will in 2 weeks.
It was a busy week here (that’s nothing new!) and we didn’t even have all our students in. Come back next week to see how far everyone has gotten!