Birthday Glassblowing

Well, it has certainly been a while since my last update. I have been swamped with life. Yesterday was my birthday, and I had the pleasure of voyaging down to Corning, NY to use their hot shop. I booked a five-hour blow slot, and here are a few photos of what went down:

I didn't get any photos of the piece I was most excited about, which was a broad, shallow vessel with a swirly ribbed-pattern that will become a birdbath once I weld up a base for it. I seemed to be on a roman bottle form kick, which is the shape you see above with the rounded base and the long narrow neck, so I ended up with a number of vases as well. I try to go into my blow slots with some amount of intention, but I so seldom get to blow glass from a furnace that sometimes I just end up having fun making disparate items. Next time it might be prudent to do some production work for the holiday season though.

I'm feeling like making some pretty blown ornaments on my torch. I think that's next on the docket, after snail shell items, which I still need to hash out and make a good number of. Soon I will have enough free time to really focus, and I am so looking forward to it.

Mo' Pendants

New Colors

In the past month I have: celebrated my grandfather's 90th birthday with family from all corners of the USA; come down with the flu and beat it back into submission; gone aggressively apartment hunting and found a new place; signed up for a bicycle ride out to Montauk Point, a half share of a CSA project, and also bought tickets for the music festival that I attend each summer. Needless to say, I've been busy.

I still find time to squeeze my glass work in, though I don't always have a chance to take pretty pictures. But I ordered some shiny new glass colors, and here are some examples of them for your viewing pleasure! The ones I'm most excited about are called Penumbra (by Trautmann Art Glass) which appears in the bluish-gray flower and also the green dots, Butterscotch (by Northstar) which is the background on the light orangey spiral and the blue flower, and Double Amber Purple, which I don't believe appears in any of these. Other colors I got include Red Elvis, Double Mai Tai, Purple Urple, Bright Blue, and Apricot.

These pendants will soon be posted on Etsy. I'm itchin' to practice my reticello technique, so perhaps that will comprise the next update!

Speaking of Etsy

I just can't contain myself. I made the most adorable little snail shell earrings the other day!

And they are now for sale at Fine Specimen! Along with two other, and soon to be more, pairs of earrings.

And this pendant is also new. I really liked how the color combination turned out!

Zipper Pouch Season

As mentioned in the previous post, I have been on something of a zipper-pouch making rampage. I blame it on the awesome purse-sewing abilities of my friend, who was telling me about this wonderful fabric store she found in Colorado, from which she produced a killer eggplant print bag. As it turns out, I found a similarly awesome fabric store in Portland called Cool Cottons, which just so happened to carry the same line of vegetable-themed fabric:

The other veggies I could find included peppers and tomatoes, but I liked the onion one the best. I went a little crazy buying fat quarters and fat eighths of fabric, many of which I have since transformed into these hella cool padded zipper pouches with bright and contrast-y linings! Because I can't seem to ever get enough zipper pouches. I'm not sure why I have such a problem, but for some reason they just make me happy.

I have been unable to make a decision as to whether or not to list these items in my Etsy store. Would it be strange to have a shop that sells mostly glass pendants and earrings, but then also a large part zipper pouches? I could possibly make other sewn items, but it isn't a combination one typically sees in the same place. Would it be too weird?