Veteran's Day, a bit late.

Our Patriotic Heart for those who we remember on Veteran's Day; and for those who serve now.

I like the more centered, stable red heart. It suggests steadfast courage and a deep, abiding Caritas.

I'm not usually this solemn. But there's something about Veteran's Day, about the chill November air and the lengthening night reminds us that life is fleeting even for the brave. Or perhaps it is especially fleeting for the brave, who know what they are risking.

The Bride's Basket Inspired Panel

This as yet unframed piece was inspired by an old quilt patch called Bride's Basket. It's meant to represent a flower and leaves in a small footed basket. I've made some changes to the pattern. Mostly the changes are in using parallelograms or trapezoids for the flower shapes instead of using right triangles as you do in fabric. In fabric the seam line between two same-color triangles visually disappears. Cutting and stitching 2 right triangles into squares is easier than stitching a trapezoid into another piece. You get the dreaded Y shaped seam.

In stained glass though, a Y shaped seam is as easy to insert as a right angle. However, each "seam line" really shows up. So although the final visual effect is the same in a quilters version and ours, we really do have to redraft the quilt patterns for glass use.

Designing Small Stained Glass Panel

I've been having so much fun with the small one piece hearts, I thought I'd try to come up with a small panel that uses them.

After playing around , I finally came up with a 7" square panel set on point. For non quilters, that means oriented like a diamond. I've a knobby English Muffle glass in a sherry color as a border, with a champagne colored background and a wine red free hand heart in the center. Since the background and border are regular, I thought I 'd more or less center an irregular heart as the focal point. It keeps the piece from being too static.



I picked warm Fall colors, but the undertones clashed. The orange red heart looks terrible next to the English muffle maroon in the border. Fortunately, the champagne swirls bridge the gap between the 2 colors.





Small panels, ornaments and sun catchers tend to be viewed up close, so the static versus flowing aspects of the design are more noticeable. In a very large piece, the most important consideration is the effect the colors have on surrounding area.

All the news that's not fit to print

Slow day- doing last minute taxes, getting bargain shelves at IKEA, the usual errands.
The bargain shelves have a light alread in in them so they uplight anything set on them. It looks like the perfect accessory for out booths, as stained glass panels set on top of these will glow. So not altogether a lost day.

Sold the ACEO from the group below.

This piece of green and streaky glass looked like a giant medusa floating in the sea. So what else could I do but I make but an ACEO with a 3D glass and wire baby jelly fish in front? To my delight, this sold yesterday. This is a nice art form.

Really Really Tiny Hearts

I can resist everything except temptation. So after a binge with an iced coffee and chocolate concoction, I could not sleep. Which is of course the best time to cut and grind glass. So a trio of very small, maybe 3/4 of an inch hearts. Oh and a bit of research into quilt designs for a new piece.
I don't know why I'm thinking of new pieces, I've 3 Baltimore album quilts blocks to finish in glass and a bunch of flower baskets to make.

Last of the ACEO's

I swear these are the last I will make for a while- well except for the ones on the soldering table board.

It's beginging to look a lot like

Okay, it's not even the end of Summer yet and I'm singing Christmas carols. It's the same every year. Of course every year the mad dash of Back to School, Halloween, Thanksgiving, St Nick and Christmas gets busier, so I try to get the small annoying stuff out of the way first. I've already collected some of the stocking stuffers and the St Nick candy. I figure I'm not the only one preparing ahead so I can enjoy holidays with my family rather than running through the mall, so I just posted this wreath on ETSY. I based this design is based on Tumbling Blocks, a quilt pattern that gives either a 3 D effect or a floral effect depending on the orientation of the diamonds and the color scheme. Here, the three stars are poinsettias and the other red diamonds are buds.

I originally designed this for my mother-in-law who moved to Georgia after a lifetime in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. She took her collection of family quilts with her. I made this to remind her of the quilts and the darker, more intense colors of Christmas in Pittsburgh, while taking advantage of Savannah glorious sunny weather in December.