Glass Class update

Good morning.  I'm up bright and early this morning, not through choice, but because my stepdaughter requested that I pick her up so she could talk to me about boys!

I haven't shown you a glass update for a while, I missed a class through migraine, then I just got too busy, but all the glass fusing is done now so it seems a good time to show you.

I've shown you the rose before, but here's a little reminder in case you weren't paying attention!

Above is the stem, three leaves and the square.  I mentioned in my last glass post that the tutor had accidentally slumped my square, then I didn't explain what I meant, just assuming you all know what that means.  You can create glass bowls by placing your piece on top of a form which is shaped like a bowl.  As it gets hot in the kiln, the glass slumps down into the mould and takes on its shape.

I love the texture on the leaves.  For glass fusing you start with a base shape of clear glass.  You then add your coloured glass on top.  I left a gap round the edge as these pieces will be encased in the lead strips to form the window.  I also left a gap in the middle as I like the effect.  I hope you can make it out in the picture above.  Fused glass is very tactile, it's smooth and rounded at the edges.

You can see above where the pieces fit onto my pattern.  The stem is made up of three fused sections.  The top and bottom sections are similar to the leaves, the middle section is made up of small squares of glass.  My colours aren't great in the above photo, it all looks a bit dull and flat, but it's actually more vibrant than that.

Now the fusing is done, I've started the long task of cutting the stained glass for the background.  This won't be fused, but will be leaded to join the parts together.  We only have 1 class left before the end of term, then there's no more classes until September.  I've ordered a glass cutter and some pliers and I've picked out some pieces of glass so I can get the cutting done over the summer. 

I'm afraid you'll have a long wait until you see the next step which is the leading!

I'm going to spend a couple of hours catching up on my blogging, then I think I'll spend the rest of the day sewing.  I have a Zakka Style project to do and I agreed to be a pattern tester for a bloggy friend - it's due to be finished tomorrow but I'm really not sure if I'll get to it.

Hopefully bloggy service will now be resumed, but please feel free to link up your LANT projects in the meantime in case I run out of things to blog about!!
Oh, I saw that one of my projects had been pinned, it was my post about Ungar and the pinner had commented that my blog also has really cute pictures of real life bunnies.  I thought I'd better live up to that.

Here are Colin and Ellis, contemplating going upstairs, but not sure if they have the energy!

And here are Harry and Tiff, wondering why a massive bag of rabbit poo is sitting outside their hutch...

Don't forget to enter my Something Old, Something New competition.  The deadline is 31st July and there is a prize!