Meet the Twiddle-Fiddle-Diddle

Isn't it funny! I spent ages trying to get a sculptural piece just right. No, I can't show it to you yet. Be patient. But as part of the prep for it, I found myself with large (we're talking at the torch here, so please see this in context) gather of glass. Sooooo....I pulled. And twisted. And twirled. And then stood like one of those kids who has played with a piece of string and tied herself in knots. So I melted one end off, all prettily, and shoved the whole thing under my fibre blanket. And forgot about it.

A couple of hours later, I started tidying up, when I noticed this rod sticking out from the fibre blanket. Oh.....it's the thingy. In order to get my rod back, I melted the other end off. Hmmm........there's quite a bit of glass at this end. If I heat it enough, I wonder if I can make a little base. Heat, heat, heat, plop. Oh yeah, a base. Great. I made a ... thing. It's small, it serves no purpose. I suppose, if you really wanted, you could plonk a couple of rings on it and call it a ring holder.

I photographed it for a laugh. And three people told me they liked it. The little twisty-twirly thing, now lovingly named...Twiddle-Fiddle-Diddle.

Is there a moral to this story?

Yes.

There is a place for twiddle-fiddle-diddles, for useless gathers of glass, random rod ends, bits and pieces. And it's not always the bin. Or the water jar.

Homemade Confetti

I've been asked by the lovely Kati to take part in her 'world beautification' project, since the current topic is......the Royal Wedding. The idea is to post a crafty tip, a recipe, anything that inspires others to get crafty. And with the Royal Wedding coming, is there a better time to take a patterned hole-punch to a newspaper (or a Shakespeare-Anthology), to create your own heart-shaped confetti?

.....it is also a great way to - erm - recycle/destroy all that annoying press about *that* date and *that* event :o)

Vorsicht Glas No. 16

The latest issue of Vorsicht Glas has been out a while now, but I wanted to get the British Craft Trade Fair out of the way before I got a chance to blog it.

The lovely Isi Merkel contacted me around Christmas, asking whether I'd be happy to be featured, and of course, I was absolutely chuffed to bits! Lampworking spread quicker in the German-speaking countries than it did in the UK, and I am always absolutely inspired by the talent there (this is not to say that I'm not inspired by the talent here ;o)) Being able to participate in glassy discussions in both English and German has been one of the best advantages of being bilingual that I can think of :o)

So, as well as posting photos of the article and crowing just a teensy little bit, a very big thank you to both my German-speaking and English-speaking glassy friends, for their ongoing inspiration!

You've been framed

I've been busy framing this afternoon - partially to find permanent 'homes' for sculptures, to make them less fragile, and partially as a way to display my jewellery for the upcoming British Craft Trade Fair.....so, I thought I'd share :o)

There's one more 'type' of frame to come, but that will have to wait until the trade fair, I couldn't get a proper photo :o)

Easter Eggs a la Batik

Hello all...I thought it might be time for another non-beadie post ;o)

Last year, I shared our family tradition of painting Easter eggs on the Frit Happens forum, but this year, I thought I'd blog about them a bit earlier, to give anybody time to get in on the action. Here's what you need:

- Eggs (no! Really? I hear you say? Yes......the whiter, the better, and scrub of that silly date stamp, if you can)
- Egg dye tablets (easy in Germany - in the UK, search for 'egg dye' on ebay or similar, you're looking for the kind where the egg is dunked into water)
- real beeswax
- lid from a tin of sweets
- pencil with a large-headed pin stuck into the back
- hob/cooker plate (electric)
- jars to make egg dye up in
- kitchen paper
- knife & fat (optional)

1) Put beeswax into tin lid and place on hob, on *low* heat (maybe 4 to get you going, but then, down to 2) - it should be about 5mm deep
2) Make up the dye in the jars (big compot jars work well, or pint glasses) according to instructions
3) Get comfy near the cooker, pick an egg, pick p your pencil (you're 'writing' with the pin head!), dunk it into the wax and *quickly* draw on your egg. You'll only ever get a single stroke or dot done before the wax is hard, so don't try to do more. Start with dots to get your confidence, if you want.
4) Dunk the egg :o) Pick your first colour, dunk - the longer the egg stays in, the more intensive the colour. While egg no. 1 dyes, paint egg no. 2.
5) Take egg no. 1 out when the colour looks right, and leave to dry on the kitchen paper. Once dry, take it back to the stove, and paint on it some more with wax, then dye a different colour.



Repeat the above steps with as many layers of colours as you like and/or have patience for.

Once all your eggs are painted, dyed and dry, you can either leave them as is, or *very* carefully scrape the wax off with a knife - this looks much nicer, as all the colours shine through properly. As a final step, use some fat (oil, butter, etc.) on a piece of kitchen paper to 'polish' the eggs.

NB: You can either boil eggs first, in which case, let them cool down before dyeing them. If you poke a hole in for boiling, close it with a dot of wax, or else the dye will run into the egg and colour it.

Alternatively, you can paint the eggs raw, then poke a hole in the top and bottom and blow them out - this is hard work, but it means you can leave them to dry before tying a piece of thread around a broken-off matchstick piece, stick it through the hole, and you can then hang it from the egg.

Happy painting, and if anybody has a go, I'd love to see pictures! For anybody interested, this method of egg painting is called 'Pysanky' or drop-pull, and is most prevalent in Eastern Europe. Our family, thanks to my son (seen in a picture from last year below) is now the fifth generation I know of to paint eggs this way.

Play Day

It's always good to push boundaries - or so I told myself when I signed up for a neon glass workshop. Yesterday, I trundled off to Neon Workshops in Wakefield for a one-day course. Following an intro about the history of neon, the various gases, burners & other equipment, we were invited to create a design that would get created by one of the course tutors in the afternoon. Well........you know me, right? After explaining that I'd rather have a wonky squiggle that was mine than a masterpiece that got made for me, I hit the burner - As you know, I do do sculpture, but bending tube was a bit of a novelty, and my main reason for signing up. I was hugely impressed with how well behaved the glass was (neon makers work with soft glass, soda lime - did you know??). I discovered a love for the ribbon burner and managed to make two squiggles in 18mm tube - then, I have to admit, I let one of the tutors join them together into one long squiggle. Filled with Argon and a hint of Mercury, the squiggle will be my 'blue sea' and will proudly live one the wall in the new studio - now all I need is some glass fishies and boats to live above and beneath it.

Here are a few photos from the day - one shows my squiggle being filled with gas, one is of somebody else's piece (done by the tutors), and one show my squiggle on the 'aging bench' (underneath the main work surface), where the colour settles after filling :o)

Studio refurbishment - exciting times are afoot!

I'm in the process of refurbishing the studio, after my better half gracefully donated the rest of the garage to me.

So far, the internal wall has been moved, the wall has been painted, existing furniture has been re-shuffled, new ventilation and some additional furniture has been ordered. There will be five ventilated spaces (four permanent torches (two big enough to handle boro, so either 'four littles' or 'two with two oxys each') and a silversmithing/occasional 5th torch space), a coldworking area with grinder and sandblaster in the far back, silversmithing set up with tumble & wheel polisher & bench drill, and a bit of space to sit/ponder/design/peruse books.





I'm hoping to be properly up and running in time for the 'teaching the teachers' course on 12th March (which I still need to blog about!), and will also start running group evening and one-day classes :)

I'm very excited bout this, and couldn't have done it without all the lovely people who came for tuition and made me realise that increasing the teaching space would be a good idea - thank you!