I never concidered working with class to be a something for me. I was very impressed by the work I saw from Yvon Trossél when I visited the glass-atelier she shared with some other artists in het hoofdkantoor during de kunstlijn two years ago.

I especially liked her work because of her use of color and style. But that never leaded me to go check out to see if it was something I could do.

But some weeks ago I found these gorgious bead-pictures on Flickr from Sarah Hornik and man did I fell in love ;0)

I don´t wear much jewelry myself, I do love the pandorra-type bracelets and have some colorfull earrings I like. But to say I'm heavy into jewelry... No.

However the beads Sarah makes are little pieces of art. The combination of colors and textures are simply amazing and that's what triggered me. I love to combine colors and textures and experiment with different techniques and somehow I feel this lampwork/glassmelting has all of that combined in it. You can make beads like Sarah's but if you feel like making beads shaped like my cat-softies I think it's possible too. So I'm getting seriously interested!

Ofcourse I could start the way I normally would, namely directly buy some stuff to get started and begin experimenting . But for once I decided to first check out if it's as wonderful as I think it will be by attending a workshop. Guess that's a result of being enormously patient the last couple of months because of my immobility. So there was something positive about it after all ;0)

So tonight I will go to the workshop and we'll just see what happens next. Shall I need to rename this blog into Glas&Zo or can I keep it as it is?

To be continued...

Well here they are... my first selfmade beads. Far from perfect and ofcourse the real beadartists probably can make them in their sleep but I'm happy and proud. It's not so simple at all to get a beautiful round bead or make perfect shaped dots.

This is what you do...
With your less dominant hand you need to keep the mandrel (that's the little specially-coated RVS-stick, wich will form the hole of your bead later on) turning round and round in a nice constant movement at the end of the torch-flame. Not simple at all but for someone with shaky hands like me... a real task ;0) Your dominant hand is used to hold the glass-rod that needs to be melted in the hotter part of the flame. Once you've melted a proper amound of glass you take both the mandrel and the melted glasrod out of the flame and wound the glass around the mandrel to form the base of the bead. You need to repeat the turning, melting and wounding untill you have a nice amound of glass on the mandrel. After that you have to keep on turning and heating the glas on the mandrel to form a nice round bead. Ofcourse if you don't turn the mandrel nicely gravity does his work and you end with a bead that's thicker at one side, like the one on the right...

After you manage to get a "nice" round beadshape decoration starts...

Karin teached me how to pull strings to make small decoration rods, how to place small dots, to make a raised flower and to put a little airbell exactly at the place you want(like in the bead on the right).

Ofcourse it's simply a matter of practice to make perfect shapes and dots and that's what I'm going to do in near future... So yes it was just like I expected and probably there will be more beads to show in future and maybe in a while I will be able to show off some nice round beads with awsome color combinations and lovely techniques ;0)

However the gypsy caravan I always told Albert I would love to have as an atelier in my backyard, would not be a luxery because if it's going to be the addiction I think it will, I will be in desperate need of some proper workplace... Ofcourse an extra garden shed will do nicely also ;0)

Marianne from 12punt3 is not only a wonderfull graphic designer, she also is the creator of wonderfull softies called oneyes. Amazing how she is able to make so many totally different softie-characters based upon one basic softie!

Finally I have some new beads to show wich I made the last couple of days, ofcourse the pictures were taken showing the best side of the beads but I'm starting to get a little bit positive about my results. Ofcourse those that didn't work out will not be shown here ;0)))

And not only once but twice. Luckely for me twice the same tagging so if you don't mind I combine them because normally I don't give in to the tagging business because they remind me to much of chainletters. Those I certainly dislike some might even say hate. Especially the ones telling you bad things are going to happen if you don't do your share or in case of the more friendly typed letters at least you will miss out of the good things that should happen...

Anyway because a sweet blue sheep and Suana tagged me I will give in for a change.

The rules Start with 7 random facts/habits about yourself People who are tagged have to write their 7 things on their blog Then choose another 7 people to get tagged and list their names Don't forget to leave them a comment to tell them they have been tagged and to read your blog

So here are my 7 facts:
1. Secretly I'm lacy, I like to spent my saturday in my pj's and sometimes don't even bother to shower at all (please don't tell anyone ;0) )
2. I love to read novels and prefer to finish my book in one day or two if that's necessary and I also prefer to read in bed...
3. I work as a secretary four mornings a week to earn my share of our living.
4. I'm terrible at math.
5. Since my mid-twenties after discovering my first grey hairs, I dye my hair because I don't like to have grey hair (well secretly I always want to look younger than I am...)
6. I'm not a real snacker but almost every week I like to buy myself a croquette.
7. I envy people who have a tidy, organised and well furnitured house but somehow my house always ends up being a total mess (luckely you aren't able to see my desk right now! I guess having my own atelier/workshop could be a great start but to be totally honest, I seriously doubt that would make any difference.

And these are the people I've tagged:
Desirée
Sonia
Amy
Barb
Sara
Sarah
Theresa

I saw this beautiful combination in "Passing the Flame" from Corine Tettinger and since I convinced myself I need to focus on one technique every time, I used this color combination to practice placing dots.

This combination was a practise on stringer control and encasing. I also tryed to make some twisties but that didn't work out real good yet and my stringer-control needs a lot more practice also... so back to my torch for practice and more practice :0)

Ofcourse I couldn't help myself, I need to play and leave the boundaries of simple practice every now and than to see if there already is a possibility to have some nice "artistic" results. Although there are some minor details in the next beads I'm not quit happy with (sorry can't help myself but I'm a bit of a perfectionist sometimes) overall I'm quit happy with them, really!

A focal à la Sarah Hornik. She was my big inspiration to start this new addiction. one side of the bead is a little bit to sharp and there are some small reactions in the glass I don't like but hey I've been doing this for let me think... 3 weeks so I should not be naging about it ;0)

And a lovely round bead with some more mixing. When you look closely you will see there's also a bit of one of my first twisty's in there and this time I also tryed to move some hot glass...

Apart from the ones I show here there are also a lot that don't make it, so there's a lot of practice needed wich ofcourse I don't mind because this playing with glass sure is addictive!