Mt St Helens From The Columbia River

I finished soldering the Mt St Helens piece and my soldering is getting a little better. I'm thinking that my Weller 80 just isn't what I need, and may splurge for a Hakko 456 soldering iron. Also my temperature regulator is inadequate, but Anne, a glasser in Canada, had one she wasn't using and has very kindly sent it to me. Thank you, Anne!

I want to put this one in a frame and take it down to the gallery. Ed is swamped with things to do, and I hate asking him to stop and make me another frame! I tried to learn how to make them myself, but it was pathetic.

I also just finished a new pattern of a schooner backlit by a big moon, but I don't know when I'll be able to start it. Things are really starting to move with the house construction (www.washnewoldhouse.blogspot.com) and I don't know how much glassing time I'll be able to get in the next few months. First things first, and we need to get the studio over the garage done before next fall.

What I Did On My Solder Vacation

I had my soldering class, and I enjoyed it very much. Let me start by saying that I waited two months for this class, only to have round two of the flu for the soldering class. The day before, I had to get my weekly trip to town out of the way, to come home to a very cheerful message on my machine saying to bring an un-foiled project, cut and ground, about 10" . Well that lets out Mt St Helens. So quickly, a relative term, I threw together a 10" project, which took about three hours to draw out, find glass, and cut out. Not the thing I wanted to do after shopping with the flu, but I really wanted to be at this class. Then I decided to play to the message again before taking a large dose of Nyquil and going to bed. UH-OH. I wasn't listening...she actually said..a 10 PIECE project. Mine had about 20 pieces. Now I'm thinking I'll wind up being the student from Hell who can't follow directions.

Some of the class was review..how to clean the glass prior to foiling, how put foil on so that it actually sticks, using a fid, etc. Review of the basics is always good. Then she got to the tricky stuff..the stuff that's hard to describe..is your iron too hot, too cold, too dirty..Are you using enough flux, too little, paste, liquid, gell? I have recently been dipping my solder in the flux, kind of wiping off the excess on the lip of the flux bottle. She uses a 1 1/2" square of standard kitchen sponge that she keeps in an (empty) yogurt container. She puts it on the lid, squirts flux on the sponge, uses that instead of a flux brush. I found I had better control with this than a brush. Then she leaves it out and used the sponge piece to wipe flux onto the solder as she goes. It worked very well. Then when she's done for the day she just pops the sponge into the plastic container and puts the lid on. The sponge stays good for a few months before it starts to dissolve from the acids.

I was putting my iron tip on the foil right at the seam, where the two pieces of glass meet, and wound up with flat seams, and I was too stingy with solder. She had me try putting the tip right where the glass and foil meet, on one side of the seam, at a 45' angle, and leaned toward the foil, slow down, and apply the solder. Holy Cow! A bead! It's a miracle! Well..sort of..every new thing I learn takes practice.

I used a geode in the center of my piece, and the edge is ..rocklike.. so she showed me a decorative solder technique where you apply a bead at the seam, then go back with a damp but not dripping wet sponge on the non dominant hand, and iron in the dominant hand. Heat the bead and while it's hot, dab it with the wet sponge. It makes a very rough spatter bead. At first I wasn't fond of it, but for certain applications, it looks good.

Mostly I need to get a better handle on my particular iron, be more generous with the solder and SLOW DOWN. All in all it was a good class, and I'm glad I went. I was hoping for a miracle pill for my soldering technique, and just like my diet, there isn't one. It made a significant improvement in my soldering, but I need practice practice practice.

Sky Pilot

I'm taking a soldering class this Saturday. Soldering is my weakest point, so hopefully I will improve. We needed to have a project foiled and ready to go for the class, so I decided to make a pattern using took a photo I had recently taken of Mt St Helens. This photo is from the Columbia River, about 15 miles west of Longview. On a very very clear day, you can see Mt Hood behind it as well.

I used my Rapid Resizer program to print out a picture about 20x12 then drew out a pattern, but two things just didn't sit right. #1 is the pattern of the water. Too many pieces, so I squiggled (is that a word?) some of them out. #2 is the sky...there just isn't a good way to do sky that looks natural. Sky has no dividing lines. I finally went with adding some clouds, although I'm not much happier with that than I am the original plan.

Tonight and tomorrow I'll get it foiled, then take it to the soldering class on Saturday.

Tranquility Falls for Healing Animals

The foiling and soldering are all done for "Tranquility Falls" for the Nan Pipestem Wildlife Rehabilitation Center's annual dinner auction. Ed will work on the cedar frame this week and I'll get it in the mail for the auction on the 21st of this month. Dare I say it.... so far....I've had no problems in mailing glass.

Thank you again to Focal Point Glassworks for a great design.

Creature Comforts

Since high school, my daughter, Ellen has volunteered at the Nan Pipestem Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Tres Pinos, California. Each year they have a fundraising auction and dinner as their primary fund event, which will be this month. You can view more information at http://www.npwrc.org/events2009dinnerauction.html . This rehabilition center is a third generation effort, with no governmental funding, and to say it runs on a shoestring is a serious overstatement. If love and commitment could be burned as fuel, these folks have a power plant.

I will be making a stained glass panel for the auction. I have two more weeks to finish cutting the glass, foil, solder, frame in cedar, and mail to California. Piece of cake. The design, used with very kind permission of Focal Point Glassworks http://www.focalpointglassworks.blogspot.com/ is a lovely waterfall landscape.

You will note that I'm saving cutting out the glass for the green part of the tree almost until last. That's because it's the glass from Hell. It's Uroboros granite ripple, emerald green, and it is absolutely beautiful glass. Probably because of my inexperience, but handling that stuff is like putting my fingers in a food processor...on purpose.

Hopefully I'll get it all cut out today, and start foiling tomorrow. It's supposed to rain all this week, which is great glass weather. I can work on it all day and not feel guilty about staying inside.

Ok well, flash forward a few hours...the glass is all cut. I managed to not flay the meat off my fingers. Actually..the glass isn't too bad if you're careful. The last time I handled any was about a year ago, so maybe I'm just more at ease.

Tomorrow...foil!

Mary, Clothed in the Sun

I decided to replace the background pieces that I wasn't happy with. On Monday, Debbie from Inspirations Glass was driving this way and brought me a piece. That was wonderful, because it saved me a two hour round trip to pick it up. Thank you Debbie!


Today I soldered the whole thing together. I'm nursing a miserable cold. The good news is I can't smell the burning flux. The bad news is..I can't smell the burning flux, so I probably inhaled way too much. In the winter, all I use is the ceiling fan to blow stuff around. I should probably re-think that part.


You'll recall from last posting that I had a tough time painting the face. I finally went with the third try, which was painted on the front and back. I also re-arranged her hair a little bit. Once it was all soldered together and in the sun, I realized that the coloration on the face was all wrong..the two coats made it too different than the hands and neck. So I took some steel wool to the baked paint on the back of the face and took it off, leaving the detail on the front of the face only. The painting technique is primative, but I still like it.







I'm also pretty happy with how the crown of stars and Sacred Heart came out. It's very pretty in the sun. I decided not to put bevels at the corners and border.

The Three Marys

I have all the pieces foiled, and am happy with the piece overall. The solder lines will add definition to the drape lines in the clothing. The background glass swirls so much that some of it looks off-grain, and I'm hoping that in the light that effect will be deminished. The background glass was so expensive that I can't bring myself to replace it.

I was having a tough time with the detail pieces. face, hands and foot. The first time, I used a champagne GNA piece and just painted line detail. Of course I got the expression on the face just like I wanted it, but when it was held up to the light it was all wrong because it was transparent. I tried painting the back of the glass, but it just wasn't right. I re-cut the face piece and painted the front with a neutral base, then tried to shade and line paint the detail. The face was all wrong, and the glass didn't fit as well as I wanted. So I cut piece #3, painted the front and back with the neutral color, added some shading to the front, and line painted the detail. It's not perfect, but I'm no artist. Because I used a brush for the base, it's streaky up close, but I think it will be ok in the light. This afternoon, after everything was painted and baked, I bought a cheapie air brush, but I don't have all the stuff I need to learn to paint with it, so this will have to do for this project.