Etsy Shop Update Tonight!

Here are the items coming to my shop tonight.  Not many, but then I have had very little time on the torch this past week.  I promise there will be so much more next Friday!

One set of copper headpins using scrumptious colors on top of ivory.  I still can NOT get enough of these!

This is the bead that  I made that was featured on the annual postcard for the Southern Flames (my local glass society).  I love all the veining on the ivory!

A cute little, green heart on a white base.

I love this transparent red and the little spirals remind me of snail fossils with their earthy shades.

And a set of swirly, blue nuggets.

These will all be getting added to the shop after 8pm EST tonight.

Shop Update Tonight!

Wouldn't you know that I start up the weekly shop update on Fridays the week before I'm going to be out of town on a Friday.  I didn't think it would be fair to make you all wait until next Friday, October 29th....so I'm listing new goodies tonight....because I have new goodies photographed and ready to go!

 I haven't made sea glass beads in quite awhile, so I thought I'd fill up the shop with several sets. :)

The newest made with sterling silver.  I left it bright and shiny but have plans to patina future sets.

These are waiting for more headpins to be made so they can be listed in a bigger set.

 

New items will be appearing in the shop after 8pm EDT tonight!

More Torch Time

This has been a productive week and we're only half way through it!  I spent more time on the torch last night and started in on Nancy's eggs.  There were four of these dark purple eggs with the mirrory, metallic finish that I love.  But one of them gave up the good fight during the dremeling/cleaning process this morning.  Sigh.

And a close up of the yellow egg.  This color wasn't on Nancy's list, but I just had to make one because the glass rods were so scrumptious.  It is a new glass that arrived yesterday and I LOVE it.  It has shades of ochre, cream and purple in it.  More rounds to follow below!

I also made this fun hollow.  Debating on making it a pendant on a necklace for my jewelry shop or as is for my beads shop.

I tried out another jar of frit from Kerry and made these little green gems.

Here are the rounds using the new glass.  LOVE!  Not sure what I would do with these, but I may just pull them back out of the shop and string them up.  They make me happy sitting on my desk.  :)

Todd has more tennis tonight, so I should be back on the torch again.  Making more eggs.  Trying out more new frit.  And new glass.  And sitting in my happy place.  Woot!

Only two more days until a three day weekend.  Yahoo!

Bead Talk #1

Some of you have asked about how the glass looks in comparison to after it has been melted into beads.  Here is a video clip discussing how I use the glass and what it does in the flame.  I also show you the glass rods in the video with the beads.

Here are the greenish nugget beads that have that wonderfully ethereal quality with the mother-of-pearl appearance.  The inner core of the bead that was unexposed to the reducing flame maintains the original green appearance.  The exterior took on a metallic finish until I encased (covered) it in clear.  That's when it turned to this lovely mother-of-pearl coloring which I love!  These will be added to my shop tonight.

Here is the same green metallic luster glass on ivory.  I love how I can see into the depths of the green in some areas (like the bead on the left) and the crackling of the ivory underneath is visible, like the bottom of a creek bed.  I love the dark outline that surrounds the green where it meets the ivory.  This is a typical reaction with any silver glass on ivory.  And then that fun metallic, mirrory finish created from the reducing flame is seen on the bead on the right.

Lastly is the pic of the striking glass on rubino (pink) and teal glass base colors.  It changed from the clearish color to yellowish greens and blues.  I need to work with this more to see if I can get any purples out of it. 

Yay for the Weekend!

This month really couldn't be starting off any better!  I'm so happy for so many reasons.  I may even be too happy.  Quick, someone slap me.

I'm finally feeling human again after having the worst case of strep I've ever had (hello, a fever of 104.5 is just not cool!) and was able to run errands this morning without getting worn out.

Our Dylan boy came home after a very long three and a half weeks of training.  He was very slow to adjust and feel comfortable with the trainer before he began taking treats.  Training a dog that has no treat or food motivation is a difficult task, so there was a good week and a half of waiting for Dylan to get with the program.  Throughout the program, I was worried we were just throwing money away as day after day I was told he was making little to no progress.  But he very thankfully pulled it together over this last week.  The trainer, along with three other trainers from the facility with over 50+ years experience total and who have worked with Cesar Milan, told us that Dylan was the most disconnected dog they had ever worked with in all their experience.  Last night was the first night he slept in his crate without whining.  At all.  Hallelujah!  The training was worth it....we got sleep and can now think about packing away his Weeping Pony moniker.

Lisa Crone of A Bead a Day blogged about my beads this morning.  Go look here!  She emailed me with the link this morning and it was the first thing I read (on my iPhone...I love it!) before I got out of bed this morning.  What a wonderful way to start the day!

My GIVEAWAY now has almost 90 comments.  Wow!  Never imagined a pound and a half of beads would draw so much interest.  I am loving all the comments with peoples' favorite blogs and/or Etsy shops.  After the giveaway is over next week, I will be pulling together a post with links for all of them and the most popular ones at the top of the list.  What a great bunch of blogs & shops we'll have named all in one place!

Todd is at a tennis match this morning, but will be watching the kids this afternoon so I can get a few hours of torch time.  I've had ten pounds of it sitting on my torch counter since Monday and I haven't even unwrapped it.  So very sad.  It has sat almost a week untouched.  That really shouldn't ever happen.  ;)  I am excited to know that in another hour or two I will be happily sitting at my torch, playing with fire, catching up on a couple of orders and then the majority of my time will be playing with new colors and combinations.  I'm excited!  Todd, come home already!!!

Tonight I will start prepping food for tomorrow.  We'll be headed to an early Easter service at our church in the morning and then coming home for lunch and to relax.  Our dinner table will have 9-12 people sitting around it and I can't wait.  I LOVE cooking for a lot of people and I LOVE having our dining room table filled with those whom we love the most.  Holidays, family and jam-packed dining room tables make me happy.

And the sun is out, giving us temps in the high 70s and low 80s.  I've had the windows open and been wearing short sleeves.  Laaaaaa!  It's almost like the angels are singing, but perhaps it is just the singing in my head that I hear as back-up singers to my joy over our weather.

I hope you all have as wonderful of a weekend as I am anticipating!  

If you celebrate Easter, then a very Happy Easter to you :)

Bead Preparations

When I opened up my blog to questions about anything, Erin left this comment: I think it is always fascinating to see what goes into making a bead. It makes me appreciate it so much more. I would be interested about the basics of how a bead is made, but also how you choose your color palette. Do you have a preconceived notion of what you want the bead to be like, or is it more organic, growing out of the flame with a mind and direction all its own?

Erin, I LOVE to know how anything and everything is made.  I enjoy watching documentaries on companies that make actual products or factory/assembly lines.  About six years ago, one of my customers that was a major carpet manufacturer gave me a tour of their factories in North Georgia.  I was captivated by the dozens of people it took to operate all the different machines and how different the materials looked at the start of the process before they were turned into carpet.  Likewise, with art or jewelry, I love knowing how each piece is made to appreciate all of the work that went into it, as well as have a better understanding of the value set on it in an Etsy shop or on eBay.

I have a tank of chemolene (similar to propane, but it burns hotter/cleaner) hooked up to my torch, as well as an oxygen concentrator.  I first turn the red knob on top to the left to let a little of the gas seep out so I can flip my lighter and get a flame out of the torch.  Then I roll the silver knob forward that is on the side of the torch to release the oxygen into the flame.  The oxygen mixes with the gas on the surface of the torch and turns the orangish-yellow flame to one that is filled with blue.  The oxygen jacks up the temperature of the flame to very hot temperatures.

I fiddle with both knobs to get even amounts of gas and oxygen to create a neutral flame.  If there is more gas coming out, the flame is more bushy and yellow and called a reducing flame.  A reducing flame brings the metals out of the glass to the surface which turn into different colors or turn into a metallic finish.  A flame that has less gas and more oxygen is called an oxidizing flame, but I don't remember why a lampworker would want that kind of flame.  Obviously I haven't used that much in the last five years! :)

Here is a video my friend Wendy made a few years ago to show you how I make the bead once the torch is fired up.  I need to get her to do it again for me so the setting is my pretty bead studio and not the garage with junk piled up all around.





After the flame is set up, I hold a mandrel in my left hand to heat it up (it needs to be hot for the glass to stick) and a rod of glass in my right hand to dance in and out of the flame so it heats up slowly.  Then I can start making the bead by melting the glass on the mandrel while constantly turning the mandrel to keep a round bead.  If I stop turning, gravity will pull the hot glass downward and then I will have a majorly wonky bead to contend with in getting it back into shape. 

As for my color palette of choices, I have a few hundred colors to choose from in my glass cabinet.  I had to do inventory of my glass a few weeks ago for my taxes and found I had close to 150 pounds of glass in my cabinet.  HOLY SHMOLY!  That's alotta glass!  Probably a little more than half of the glass is opaque.  I'm not good at choosing four plus colors of glass to mix on one bead.  I like to keep things simple, so I normally choose two colors or sometimes three if I'm feeling a little crazy (although may have to pull out my color wheel to see what three colors line up in the spinning triangle...I think the art term for those three colors is trident, but I could be mixed up).

Most of the time when I sit down at the torch, I have some orders to make and those are first on my list to get in the kiln.  I pull out the necessary colors and get to work on my orders.  Sometimes working on those orders will spark new ideas of variations on those same beads in color/shape or completely new beads.  A lot of times, I already have ideas floating in my head during the week of what I want to make when I do get to sit down at the torch on weekends.  If my mind is blank and no inspiration is in me when I look in my glass cabinet for colors to pull out, I'll ask my kids what colors they would like for me to use in a bead for them.  That's enough to get me started and then I easily flow in other directions with new beads.

I do try to have the colors out ahead of time and know what kind of bead I want to make because it is difficult to keep a bead warm enough and in the shape by continuously turning the mandrel while I back away from the torch, open my glass cabinet, turn on the little light inside and lean over to search for the specific color, pull it out, turn off the light, shut the cabinet and go back to the torch.  All of my glass is organized by manufacturer on each shelf and then by color, so I've got a good idea ahead of time where to look.  But still.  I try to avoid those hassles by knowing what I want to do before I even heat the mandrel for the bead.

I Didn't Fall Off the Edge of the Earth

I just landed in sunny, warm Arizona last Saturday night!  And have spent hours upon hours catching up on my family blog.  It had been since the end of January when I last posted on there with pics of the kids and updates about what our family was doing each week.  I was sensing a planned revolt and flogging from some of the grandparents.  I spent a good two hours on the flight editing pics, cropping them down to size and adjusting the exposure if I had blown it in the sun on the playground. 

Every night since Monday after we got wireless internet set up, I have spent 2-3 hours adding posts to the family blog.  As of 7:30am Mountain Standard Time (Arizona doesn't follow daylight saving time), I am caught up with all of the pics that were on my laptop.  Now, I can breathe.  I still have hundreds of pics on my camera that I need to upload of our vacation so far.  But I can breathe.  I am caught up with everything loaded onto my laptop.  And now turn my attention back to my beads blog.  Yay!

A couple weeks ago I asked if anyone had any questions for me and you guys came through.  I'm starting with Tari's from Pearl & Pebble: I wouldn't even know where to begin with specific glass questions!! You play with fire and I am afraid of playing with fire and so I never learned how to speak "glass." My adjectives include smushed and swirlly! Although you've probably already blogged about it,because you ARE a fantastic blogger, how long does it take you to make a bead like that big swirlly one with all the colors. (The one you have been hoarding)And do you have a varigated glass stick or do you lay each color down individually? Can you completely control glass, or will there always be that element of suprise? Ok so maybe I had a few!!!

Tari, I don't think you would be as scared of playing with fire if you were in my studio.  Here's your open invite to come sit with me if you ever venture as far South as Atlanta.  It sounds scarier than it is.  The torch is stationary.....it is screwed in tight to the torch counter, so it's not moving.  And the flame points away from me, so my whole body is behind with my arms on either side and really only my hands come close to the flame.  The flame is approximately 1500+ degrees hot, so my hands feel the heat well before coming close enough to get burned.  If I take my time to slowly warm up rods of glass, it is unlikely it will break and fly back at me from temperature shock.

My adjectives are the same. :) I don't know the technical, glass terms that are used by the masters.  I have read very few books on lampworking and have had only a handful (okay, maybe three) informal lessons at the torch between my Aunt Gail and my friend Diane Kovach when I first started lampworking in 2005.  I have seen perhaps a dozen demos from highly respected artists at various monthly bead meetings between the Southern Flames in Atlanta and now ASGB in Arizona this past weekend.  I like swirly, smushed, smashed, squashed and any other term that literally refers to a bead. :)

It took me probably close to 45 minutes to make this big, swirly, hollow bead.  This was an all ivory hollow to start with before I decorated it with Striking Color glass that turns all these different colors through a heating, cooling, re-heating, re-cooling (over and over. and over).  I also added silvered ivory (which is made by melting sheets of 99% pure silver onto ivory and then pulling it out into long, skinny rods of glass called stringers...one of the few technical terms I do know!) between the shocks of Striking Color.  The more heat applied to silvered ivory on a bead, the more it expands and spreads little cracks and veins over the surface.  I didn't get a picture of the rods of glass before I left, but it's initial appearance is very underwhelming.  I still look at it and wonder how such a vomitous color of a brownish glass rod can turn into such stunning blues, greens and purples.

 
Most of the silver glasses (many are made by Double Helix and have names like Aion, Gaia, Ekho, Triton, Psyche, Kronos, Terranova or others) have these wonderful color-changing reactions, or can take on metallic appearances if reduced in the flame (a flame that has more fuel than oxygen because most lampwork is made in a neutral flame with even amounts of fuel and oxygen).  The rods can be clear, black, transparent blues or greens or that ugly, brownish/vomitous color.  After the silver glass is worked in the flame, it looks dramatically different from the original rod of glass.  Most of the other glasses, whether opaque or transparent, will look very similar to the rod form after they have been melted to form a bead. 

Some color changes can occur due to chemical reactions between glasses/colors, but most of the time I have a very good idea of what the bead will look like using the glass colors/rods I choose.   I feel like I do well at controlling the glass to make it do what I want it to do.  I can make the shapes I want and 99.999% of the time the colors and the beads turn out exactly how I want.  With some glass colors, they change or strike in the kiln.  So there is some surprise with how those look when the kiln is opened. 

Normally, my biggest surprises are how many beads I pull out of the kiln.  I'm shocked at how many I have made.  Time flies when I'm having fun.  I lose track of time and count of the beads I make.  Sometimes I only make a dozen and other times I am surprised with almost 90 beads like this weekend when my husband helped give me hours upon hours on the torch.

Thanks for asking so many questions, Tari!  My next post will answer Erin's questions. :)

I do it all.....all by myself

No helpers or magical elves. Not even any child labor (yet! they're still a little too young to do anything other than request certain color combinations, shapes or designs).

I dip the mandrels. I melt the glass. I wind the beads onto the mandrels. I stick them in the kiln. I take them out the next morning. I twist and tug and pull the beads off the mandrels. I grind my teeth and then twist and tug and pull some more. I clean them out with my speedy dremel. I take the pics with my digital camera and then crop & edit each pic. And then I list them in my Etsy shop. All for your viewing and buying pleasure.

I'm not complaining. This. Is. What. I. LOVE. To. Do. :)

And this is where it happens. My studio; that I love so much and that I moved into in Sept 2008 after spending several summers sweating buckets and winters freezing under multiple layers of clothes & goose-down comforters in the garage. My Mega-Minor Burner torch is at the workstation closest to the window on the left, which is also closest to my fan/ventilation hidden behind the green square box on the wall. I have a second Minor Burner torch at the work station on the right. An oxygen concentrator is tucked away in the footspace under each torch station. And hoses run from the torches through the wall to my backyard where the propane tank is housed safely outside.

I've got great overhead lighting mounted under the top cabinets so I can see what I'm doing at the torch. Sooooo much better than the dismal lighting I had in the garage! Mandrels are standing upright in that wooden block in the center of the counterspace.

Here is my glass cabinet. Front, center & easy to reach for a midget like me....it's the floor cabinet so no tip-toe reaching or counter climbing to get to the most important stuff! Bottom shelf has German glass, filigrana (clear rods with cores of color shooting through the middle) and stringers (really thin rods of glass). First shelf up from the bottom is strictly transparent rods of Italian glass. Second shelf up is nothing but opaque rods of Italian glass. Next shelf is more German glass. And the top shelf which you can barely see is filled with soft glass from China. So many colors and not enough time to play & create! Special pliers & smashers hang from the insides of the doors.

Here is a more current view of part of my workstation. Glass rods still on the counter from my last glass shipment that either haven't found a home yet in the glass cab or I'm still playing with the cool new colors. Like the Elphaba greens :) Little jars are on the back shelf, filled with all kinds of frit combinations. Rods of either half-used glass of unknown colors or 'cool' bonus colors stand upright in jars next to my large mandrels, a color wheel, the Southern Flames 2008 postcard, the necklace I won at our beadswap meeting hangs from my torch deflector. And my iPod nano & docking station Todd got me for my birthday....very important to have good tunes for jammin at the torch :)
And a view into one upper cabinet that is organized enough to share. Mostly shipping supplies where they are nicely stacked, but normally out-of-sight when the doors are shut.

I really can not thank my husband enough for supporting my fire-playing hobby and being super-cool about me moving my studio inside the house. Of course, there was a perk in it for him....for the first time since we moved into this house in 2005, he can now park his car in the garage. That alone may have been worth the cost of constructing my studio for him :)