Symmetry

Wow.

Symmetry from Everynone on Vimeo.

Pink!

Here's the start to finish on my last jewelry series. Turned out really well I think.

The pile of lots of glass. Lots of clear, lots of pink, little purple, and a tiny bit of blues and greens. Had fun making all the little components (the dots and little layered chunks).

Fired! :0) (a closeup so you can see the detail) The light purple reacted a little with the pink and looks light gray.

A few more firings to thin the chunks out. The original firing left the jewelry blank at about 1/2" thick in the middle. That would make very chunky jewelry! I did do a few circles out of the thick glass.

Cut up pieces. Ready for shaping.

The lap wheel grinder that does the fine tune shaping. I usually grind off my fingernails in this step. After shaping, the glass was fired again and then sandblasted and fired one more time to a "fire polish" to make them all shiny and smooth.Out of the final firing and ready for bails. The donut one had the inside hole drilled out of a big piece and then fired so it thinned out and stretched to a oval shape. Then drilled the bigger hole and shaped, fired again to get the final shape. I really like the donut pieces but they are quite time consuming so I don't make very many of them.

Sitting at the kitchen table gluing bails on and prepping to put in the oven overnight to cure the glue so its super strong. I started doing this step a couple years ago and found the bond is much better. I usually "bake" them on a thick piece of plywood with foil on it so my kitchen smells weird for a while. :0)

Ta-da! The finished pieces. Well, a few of them anyway. The total project made about 35 pieces I think. Made 3 pair of earrings so that's fun. My kiln should arrive in the next week or two! Excited. :0)

For my Pottery fans. :0)

Yes, you know who you are. Here are a few pieces from the last firing that came out a week or so ago. I am taking a break from pottery until June so I can take a glass class so these might be the last you will see for a little bit.

This is a bowl that is about 6" across. I made my mom a set of 4 of these without the rim for Mother's Day. I really like the colors and how they turned out. Forgot to take a picture of mom's set.

This is a fun shallow serving bowl. About 12" across or so. Lots of blue.

And my signature color combination again. This bowl (12") turned out especially nice. Love the green where the colors overlap.

A new technique for me called gashu (I am sure I spelled that wrong). You paint a slab of clay with a black paint like stuff and let it dry, then press texture into it and then throw the slab to thin it and stretch the clay. This piece turned out well. Another piece I did didn't look as good. :oP

A tray. Used one of the new molds David made me. Very cool. The shallow molds worked great. The deeper molds I had trouble with so we will go back and tweak the design.

Convo with Mom today

I was telling mom about the food at the wedding I photographed with Blanca last night and we were discussing the ravioli. :0)

Me: It was stuffed with something orange, maybe squash.

Mom: maybe it was pumpkin. Were the bride and groom Italian?

Me: no, they were white.

Mom: Italians are white.

Me: Italians are a little brown. These people were Texas white. You know, boots and all.

Mom: ah. Yes. I know what you mean.

Me: it probably was pumpkin ravioli. whatever it was it was tasty.

In other news, I put some recent photoshoots up on my blog.
http://m-photodesign.blogspot.com/