During the winter months I cozy up to a warm fire and either knit or crochet. I am very content to stay a beginner in knitting and crocheting. My time is usually spent on hats, small bags and flowers. The buttons go well for each of these, and I can pick and choose the colors I like.

Our buttons have a sterling silver shank in the back. I make them concave so they can be large and strong. Our average size button is 1 1/2” across. Each one of them are a little color palette of fun! You never know, when you set down at the torch, just what the outcome will be. Sometimes it is quite a surprise when they come out of the kiln.

I have a friend that felts purses and bags and the buttons go very well with them. It’s funny…One day I was in a new yarn shop in town and spotted the most wonderful unique felted bag. I didn’t know the person but wanted so bad to look at her purse. I approached her to tell her how much I liked her purse…well the rest of the story is that there are a few of my buttons on the felted pieces that she makes. You never know when a new friend will appear on the scene and love the things that you also love ! ! !

Take care

Bobby

Norm came home from work one day and announced that we were not going on vacation this year ! ! !  We were going to take workshops dealing with glass.

He had signed us up for 3 different classes; slumping, fusing and lampworking. I didn’t mind since I like spending time with Norm. We went to the slumping class first and it was fun but it really didn’t interest me. We then went to the fusing class, and same thing, fun but not something I wanted to do.I told Norm that he could pursue the glass but I would be sticking with woodworking.

He then took me to lampworking where you get to play with fire…yeah for me ! ! ! Lampworking was an all day class and during the morning you learned the feel of hot glass…like playing with honey on a dipper. I didn’t like the hot glass since it wouldn’t do as I wanted. Wood was more forgiving and more hands on and if you made a mistake you just re glued it and started over.

We broke for lunch and I told Norm that this wasn’t going to be for me either so he would have to be the one to make the beads for us. We went back to the torch and proceeded to learn more about the glass. I’m not sure what happened since I didn’t believe in magic; but something magical did happen.

On the way home I informed Norm that I was going out and buy myself a torch and was not going to share it! Norm works outside the house and told me we should buy one torch since he would only want it on Saturdays. I informed him that I would need it on Saturday also. He said I had all week to play with the torch.

So end of story…we bought 2 of everything we would need. We do share the same kiln and that is ok.

I went home from that one day class and put 20 years of the woodworking business in a box and have not looked back since. I still love the smell of a woodworking shop and build a few thing now and again just for us but the glass has a very big hold on me.

That class was almost 15 years ago and the glass has opened doors to other things we enjoy, but that is another story…..and yes “I do believe in Magic.”

Bobby

Norm asked me just how many pliers I really needed and I told him I need all of them. Tools are another one of my loves. I make quite a few of them, since the one you want either doesn’t exist or is not in the budget plan. Besides, I get to play with more fire!

I generally modify the tools I use to fit my needs. A pair of tweezers cut down and slotted to hold glass rods. I can use up the complete rod this way. I made a rounded handle to make it easy to roll in my fingers like you would the rod of glass.

These are my favorite tools:

I use the first one on the left for flattening the glass.

The second one is my initial “B” for stamping in the hot glass.

My favorite tweezers for cleaning things off the glass.

Pick for making holes and dragging the glass.

Glass holder for the short pieces.

My button shank pliers to hold and press the shank into the back of the glass.

Another photo of my “B” stamp and my modified tweezers for holding short pieces of glass in the flame.

Later

Bobby

Shards became another passion that I explored.

I still make shards and enjoy applying them to the beads I make. They have become one of the few things that I revisit now and again. I love the hot bubbles and breaking them up into manageable pieces. And “yes” I need many many colors, who knows when the muse will strike!

I make my shards on a hollow mandrel that I has a soft tube attached to one end. I use a small clip to keep the tube closed till I get the hollow ball of glass just the way I want it. When everything is looking good I give it a lot of heat without melting everything back into a solid ball. Then I take the clip off the end and give just a small puff of air till it starts to move. When it starts to move I blow harder and steady. If everything is the way it should be the glass will expand quite a bit. I can then lay the glass balloon down on my worktop and wait for it to cool. Sometimes it will shock and then there is a bang that if you are not ready for will make you jump out of your skin. But hey….there is where the fun comes in…keeping you on your toes.

This is one of my favorite pieces and is one that I am keeping! It is a transparent cranberry colored disk of glass that I blew a hole in ( that will be another blog ! ), I melted a piece of yellow glass for the center, and applied a shard that was created using Raku type frit that I had made. I mounted it on a sterling silver pendant that has a hole in the back so you can hold it up to the light and see all the colors in the glass.

There are so many variations to lampworking that even if I live to a hundred I will have only scratched the surface.

I think that is what keeps the magic going.

Enjoy.

Bobby

I went on a quest and needed every color and in three sizes of all the glass rods that I have. I tend to do things in a big way and once the “muse” has left I usually don’t return. Too many things to explore and the list just keeps growing…you know the saying…”one thing leads to another!” I have a lot of frit to play with for now. I make my frit by the lolly-pop method which includes lots of heat and popping glass. You not only get to play with fire, you get to shatter some hot glass.

My lolly-pop method of frit starts off with a pint sized canning jar of water. Make a large gather of glass on the end of a mandrel. When it is very soft mash it into a lolly-pop shape. Heat it up again but not so hot that you loose the shape. I then heat up the glass close to the mandrel and pull the lolly-pop down so that there is a short string of glass between the mandrel and the lolly-pop. Heat up the lolly-pop again to make sure it has not lost it’s heat and dip the glass into the water just shy of the mandrel. It will break off on the thinest string of glass. This keeps the dirty mandrel out of your water and all your glass very clean.

When I get all the frit I need I pour the water and frit through a sieve and let it dry. I also use three different sieves to size my frit. I keep it all stored in small containers to keep it clean and separated.

Enjoy

Bobby

When I first started working with glass I think I went a little crazy. Spent every penny we could dig up for glass and supplies….Beans and rice for dinner again! It was a little bit of forethought for us since glass skyrocketed to prices that you could not imagine. I thought the price for a pound of Morretti was kind of high for glass, I just needed all those colors and at least a pound of each, and I didn’t want to take the chance of running out. In reality I could never use all that glass in a life time, but I’m still working on using it all up.

I added Bullseye Glass to my stash about ten years ago and just love the vibrant colors. It is a little stiffer than Moretti and sculpting with it is a dream. I am willing to pay the price for the Bullseye glass but just can’t stock pile it like I did when we started melting glass.

Norm built us a shelf system for the pvc pipe we use to store all of our glass. Bullseye, 90coe on one side and all the 104coe on the other side. I only have one coe on my work top at a time and as of yet haven’t mixed them up. “YET”!

COE stands for the Coefficient of Expansion in the glass. The expansion of the glass when it is hot and when it is cooling off will differ between different glass. So you really have to be aware of the coe of your glass before you start using more than one color for your beads. If you mix different coe’s your glass will cool at different rates and cause the glass to separate from the other.  This will cause your beads to either crack or break entirely.  There is a wealth of information on the coe’s of glass out there for the lampworker, and if you have any questions that I can answer I would be more than happy to do that. 

Take care…

Bobby

I have been lampworking for close to 15 years and the magic is still there. I share my glass passion with jewelry now and they seem to compliment each other and fill my days. I am still using the original kiln to anneal all of my glass. I have added a few tools but like to make my own when I can.

There is nothing sacred in our house that I won’t turn into a tool. Norm “forbids” me to take any more of our utensils out to the studio. You cannot believe how many spoon bowl shapes there are and just the perfect one is the one that you might need.

These spoons are the first that I confiscated from our kitchen and I am still using them. I also took my curling iron apart to get the curve to press a hot bead into, I didn’t use it anyway so it made a good tool to have on hand. I know…too late on the crazy part but it keeps the magic alive!

Bobby

In my dream I was making a new piece of jewelry from the bronze that I have. In the dream it went smoothly, step by step and when I finished the piece it was perfect.

The first thing I did was to burn a hole in the bronze while getting the pure silver to fuse. I have done this before in real life and ruined the piece I was working on! But in my dream state it was just the thing to do on purpose for the idea that I had.

I also seemed to be working on circle shapes that had layers that were connected together. Things in the dream made so much sense and it was so easy to complete each step. In real life time there were a “few” stumbling blocks and way longer time frames to work things out. I think that on this piece the dream state was way more fun!

But is that what it is really all about – everything turning out just as you have planned it, step by step.

I’m not sure, since it seems to me that there would be no challenge or learning curve. And you know how I love to be on a new learning curve!

All that aside, the piece did turn out somewhat as I dreamed it. It has also opened up a few more avenues to venture down. So dreams can really come true…..you just have to remember to believe in them and go for it!

Bobby

Pieces of bronze sheet to play with. It doesn’t look like much right now but when we get through….Just wait and see!

She had so many new and exciting things to show she was beside herself. We took a moment so I could write them down before they flew off into cyberspace to never return.

Bronze? Now what do I do with bronze? I have cast a few pieces for fun but never thought of it as something I could do for jewelry pieces. But….Bronze sheet, fold formed, worked and shaped is something I could really get to like. It seems to have a very warm color, not as bright as copper or as expensive as silver. It is easy to work with and takes abuse from the hammers and the flame, two of my favorite things, flame being my first love.

Being a pyro is a very exciting thing!

So after much abuse and no planning, I am pleased with the results of the first piece.

I think I will be playing with bronze for awhile. I just love new ideas, especially when they lead to more ideas in a mist of chaos. Too many ideas and so little can make one go into a frenzy.

A few of them will have to be put on that back burner again but they should know that it won’t be for long before they can come forward.

Good ideas will wait for no one, they just keep coming to the front and won’t let up until you finish them. So off to hammer on some more bronze and see where it will take me.

Catch you later…Bobby

This piece is a ponytail cuff done in copper with silver fused to the surface and fold formed in a “what if I do this” manner. I have very short thin hair and have never been able to have a pony tail, but I love them the same. So this little piece will stay awhile till I figure out if it will be a gift or a product. Might keep it for the first Sat market show this April….we shall see.

This is the back of the piece.  You hook the silver rod over the rubber band that holds your ponytail together.

Enjoy

Bobby