I save everything, especially art supplies. Sometimes this is useful, sometimes it just creates a storage problem. 😉
For years now, I have saved every single glass rod scrap – those ends that I couldn’t bear to throw away but weren’t long enough to make a bead.
The pile grew and grew.
Recycle
So I decided to try fusing. This is an art form that involves glass in a kiln, heating to melting temperature, creating a fused glass piece.
My first effort wasn’t for art, but to see if I could program my digital kiln to do the job. (I’ll be honest – it took some effort. ha!)
But !viola! Success!
I’m keeping this piece forever. *love*
Fusing allows me to use scraps and create larger pieces.
Then IÂ set out to try some new ideas. Fusing is often a multi-step creation process. Â A full fuse melts the glass smooth. A tack fuse sticks the glass together, but leaves it raised for texture. Sometimes I do a full fuse then come back and do a tack fuse of more glass on top of that for layering and texture.
This kiln batch features a mix of these two types of fusing.
The tree form on the bottom right (using green and brown glass rods) came out of a full fuse like this:
I did a full fuse of simplistic flowers (in above photo), then added in some additional elements for another full fuse firing.
I tried out some enamel (powered glass) decals for fusing projects.
Then back to the torch! I decided to use my torch and regular methods of working with glass to create some flower petal and leaf components.
The two flower pieces in this kiln photo show how I used the lampworked pieces together. The fused tree got some ornaments for this tack firing.
The kiln was ramping up for my first tack fuse experiment. I was soooo excited!
Then… Just as my kiln reached temp, this happened.
No power for about 380,000 of us in this area.
My area was hit with a huge wind storm. Not just my area, the entire state of Washington. This was a massive storm with sustained 50-60 mph winds and peaks over 100mph in some areas, which is almost unheard of here — a few hundred miles inland.
So many downed trees and power lines! Crews are out everywhere, including power line crews from California and Nevada, working 24/7 to help bring back power but with so much damage, it is going to take time.
No power for 2 days now, and probably not for another 2 to 3 days. With predicted temps in the teens tonight it will be chilly, but I am thankful that trees didn’t land on my house or car. The glass in my kiln survived the rapid cool down, and we have a generator. Always a bright side.
Because of this storm and running half-strength on auxiliary power, it will be a few days before I am back up with new listings. Thank you for your patience.