IFC 2013

Glass birds by Vittorio Costantini

This past weekend I attended the International Flameworking Conference in Salem, New Jersey. I stayed with one of my Alfred friends, a former classmate and glassblowing partner. Some of the highlights were watching Vittorio Costantini, Eunseuh Choi, and Micah Evans demo their techniques, seeing a couple familiar faces, and watching two bald eagles fly overhead.

And! Paul Stankard complemented my implosion flower pendant that I was wearing and I totally geeked out. He asked if it was soft glass, I told him it was boro, and he thought it showed a level of delicacy not often seen in borosilicate implosion work. Thanks Paul!! I'm flattered! :)

Steve working in his studio

A bald eagle's nest! We saw three nests and two bald eagles.

Artist Eunseuh Choi's demo

A sampling of my goodies from the conference vendors.

Flame On

Another photo update of the things coming out of my kiln...

Beads! I had a soft glass day the other day. I like to do that every now and then, change things up a bit. It's a completely different animal, much more, shall we say, "responsive" than borosilicate. Perhaps one of these days I'll get into the habit of donating to Beads Of Courage.

Made some more of the ever-popular mustache pendants.

And also a tiny amphora vase, in keeping with my spontaneous tiny vessel fixation. This guy is just over an inch tall.

Pick Your Poison

A preview of the vials in varying degrees of tininess I've been making that will soon be coming to a Fine Specimen shop near you...

Action

I would like to share an adage I heard the other day that might possibly become my mantra:

Action is the foundation of all success.

I have had problems with motivation for quite a long time, back through high school and middle school, and I can't speak to elementary school but it always comes down to STARTING whatever needs to get done. Once I start on something, I usually work away at it until it is all or mostly complete. The problem is, I can dance around projects like no other by finding other things that need to be done, like cleaning the house or making a needlessly elaborate dinner.

So I'm going to start reminding myself that action is the foundation of all success. Because that's honestly one of my biggest hurdles.

New Fascination: Hourglasses

It took me a few attempts to get it right, but I finally ended up with this hourglass that I'm fairly happy with. It is about five inches tall, and it measures 3 and one quarter minutes.

The adorable small ones I had intended as my end product gave me such a hard time that I didn't complete a single one despite many, many attempts. I got them 95% of the way though! The very last step was where the problem was, which was quite frustrating.

Maybe someday I'll reach this level of awesomeness: Ikepod Hourglass by Mark Newson