Catch up

Well I promised you a decent post over the weekend and I failed! I’m sorry, lump of coal for me this year! I’ve been manic! The workroom is go go go! I got a fair few commissions which are all to be done this week and a few ideas in my head demanding to be hammered out on metal! It’s great!

 So catch up!  

Working up to 850, fire extinguisher within reach!

I spent a good chunk of last week enamelling, made lots of rubbish and mistakes and several fires (eeek) and then proper decent stuff that I’m really proud of, especially the bunny brooch, as well as a few things that are nearly made that I think will be fab! So I am eager to get back to it.

For those that don’t know, enamelling involves powder, sometimes suspended in a liquid, glass which you place on a piece of metal and stick in a kiln for a little over a minute at 850 degrees Celsius, hence the few little fires! It’s great for heating the apartment, not sure I’ll be much of a fan of it in August, but on these horrible December days it’s pretty great! And I love the orange red glow of the metal when you take it out of the kiln! The whole process is fascinating!



The results and cause of the first incident; its the paper I
use to protect the kiln when I fuse glass, it usually goes up
to 800 degrees but takes a few hours to get there, apparently when
 you heat it fast it starts smoking at about 400 degrees!





On Saturday I had my second craft fair, it was good fun, not hugely lucrative but it is really good and helpful to see peoples opinions of my stuff, the stag pendant was a particular hit, which is not my favourite so that shows me!

Sunday was recovery day spent playing computer games and reading J Everyone needs a break! And yesterday and today were all about laying the basis of several of the commission pieces, I like to swap around between projects as I work, so I have multiple pieces on the go at the moment. Will be able to move on tomorrow when I get my Cookson delivery of my new weighing scales (note to self don’t leave these ones in the wet, damp, humid, bathroom!) and I can make up some fresh pickle (acid to clean the fire marks off metal), I’ve killed the last batch! Woohoo for Cookson and their amazing delivery times!

So busy Sarah! Lots to be doing! But now I am going to go and rot my brain a little by watching the train wreck that I know my Big Fat Gypsy Christmas will be! ...I can’t not look!