Cranberries and Grout

What do cranberries and grout have in common?  Pop!

There's nothing like the rich color and the smell of cranberries cooking to remind me of the holidays...I love it when they POP!

Paul and I will head up to Maine early tomorrow morning to prepare for our Thanksgiving with Margie and our son Sam. It's going to be nice having a new addition to our holiday table.

Just as I hoped the gray grout makes the colors and shapes POP on the mosaic mirror. I've only done the first cleaning....I need to let it cure before I clean up the crevices and polish the glass and mirror.

Learn As I Go

In between Thanksgiving prep I worked on a couple of projects today....one of them a simple mosaic project.  I repurposed a wide frame with a little 3 inch opening and just happen to have a mirror that fit perfectly. 

I decided to do a blue sea glass color scheme....seemed kind of practical.  All the glass is glued down with Weldbond. 

My hope is that the colors will pop with the dark gray grout....I'll do that first thing tomorrow morning. 

I'm including the picture below so I could mention a few "learn as I go" lessons.  The frame had a crazy black and white pattern so I primed it white.  Then I realized I didn't want to put glass on the the skinny inside rim of the opening so I had to spray paint it black...the only black paint I had here in Lexington.  Finally I could get started.

I did the outside edges first with light blue glass strips and let them dry a few hours so I could handle it without them moving.  

I framed the opening in medium blue then added the tiny square purchased mosaic pieces.  The dark blue squares were going to be the next row...but the math didn't work and there was no way to make them line up without cutting some of the squares down. So I abandoned them and came up with another plan. We'll see....I seem to be saying that a lot these days. 

Grout Lessons

I spent all morning cleaning up and polishing my glass projects.  The goal was to get the grout off the glass leaving it just in the gaps. 

Mostly I used this stiff brush...but I also used a knife for a little scraping and fine sandpaper.  It was tedious and messy.  The grout comes off in a fine black powder....it was everywhere. Remember...I'm learning as I go. This is my first crack at mosaic.



When I made that first glass piece....I wasn't happy with the off white grout.  After doing some research I found some helpful tips.

1.  Contrast is key...you want the glass to stand out and the individual pieces to stand apart.
2.  Think of it as an outline.
3.  When in doubt...use black.
4.  Avoid colors....leave that for the glass.
5.  Avoid white...unless you want it to look like a summer camp project.

So I bought a dark charcoal gray grout for the rest of the projects and....I'm sold!

I was a little worried about this one after it was all glued down....but dark grout made a big difference.

And that first one I wasn't happy with...

...the grout sunk in enough so I was able to add a thin layer of the dark gray grout and it's much better now. 

Contrast, definition, outline....lessons learned.

I'm Back!

It was both good and bad to be without my computer for a few days.  It was kind of nice being unplugged for a bit...but I missed the ease of connecting with people and my creative computer routines....including my evening blog post. So for better or worse I'm back.

It's hard to know where to start....so I'll begin at the end and work backwards over the last few days. While I was in Lexington I was busy with more glass projects.  I will likely write more about the process in another post but today you just get an overview...it's already late.

I had taken most of my fabric projects home so was able to spread them out on the dining room table with the new glass stacks. I think they are a good addition to the collection and something totally new for this third show.

I like this view below mostly because of a few things in the background....like the large foxtail fern I brought in from the back patio. I will winter it inside and take it back out in the spring. There is a lovely Rex Begonia there on the floor too.  It's good to have some of the fall chores done and my plants inside safe from frost.  And don't you love the little high chair?  I sat in that as a child as did my eight siblings.

The other thing in the background is my wabi-sabi wreath that I haven't had the heart to take apart.  I do really love it.  It's been sitting on the dining room table for all this time so had to be moved out of the way...maybe it's time take it apart. I'll save all the part...so they'll be back sometime too.

Glueing and Waiting

I glued the glass onto the wooden base today for my second glass stack experiment.

The cutting and gluing went pretty fast but it took most of the day because there was lots of wait time while each side dried.

          

The focal layer is bright and happy and I kept the the rest of it pretty simple....I think it's going to be OK.  I really have to think about the grout color this time....all I know is it can't be just white.  

Anita and I also went to a quilt show here in Lexington this morning and this was my favorite.  It's made with many of the same Kaffe Fassett stripes I've been using in my stacks.  It reminds me of all the ways this fabric can be used to create a completely different look.  I think the transition of colors through the spectrum is very nicely done.  I thought I would be able to zoom into the name to give the artist credit....but it's too blurry. 
 

It was fun to see a postage stamp quilt by a friend of ours...Shirley Bergey.  It contains 6,715 pieces and is both hand and machine stitched.  Kind of mind boggling!

Harder Than I Thought

Over the past couple of days I kept moving along with my glass stack experiment. I will admit it ended up being harder than I thought...or at least trickier. 

I glued the side pieces on....that went OK. 

And I grouted....and that seemed to go OK....but I sure made a big mess.  I took the photo below right after I took my gloves off....it had to sit for a few minutes before I started cleaning it up.

I still need to do some more cleaning and buffing...but this is where I left it today before I headed to Maine. It's OK....but as usual I've learned some lessons and there are things I will do differently next time.

One of my problems is that I may have made the wrong decision about which edge of the glass to expose.  I chose to have the side glass edges exposed on the front creating this pinstripe frame. I could have had this line on the sides which I think would have been better.  Some of the edges of the glass have a very grainy texture....especially that top blue piece so it looks a little rough. 

I also don't really like the white grout....it should have been tinted and I may still be able to do something about that.  It is an off white and looked darker when I put it on....but it sure dried brighter.

I'm not loving the neutral glass I chose...it's too tan. It should have been more on the creamy white to gray side or I should have just stuck with the blues and greens.  So I need to plan my color scheme a little better next time. I really just jumped right in and didn't really do much auditioning or planning at all.  

Grouting is a little harder than I thought and probably just takes practice....and maybe some better tools. I think the general concept is good...so I'll do a little more research and planning and try it again on a smaller scale.

My favorite part of getting back to the glass was wearing these white cotton gloves.  My sister Becky, who passed away several years ago of breast cancer, gave me a whole bag from her time working at a factory.  They are especially useful when you are soldering glass because of the heat and they protect my fingers when I cut glass. And when I need to grind a piece of glass it gets wet and I have a built in towel right on my hand.  I actually got a little emotional when I put them on this time....I miss her!

How Hard Can It Be?

I want to have more than just fabric in this next show....so I'm diving back into an old hobby and giving glass stacks a try. I've done a fair amount of stained glass using the copper foil and soldering technique...but I've always wanted to try mosaic. How hard could it be? I have lots of glass...and several years ago even bought Welbond Glue and grout.  I was ready to go.


I'm using a long wooden canvas as my base....it's about 6 by 26 inches. All the glass is opaque so no light source is needed. The spaces will be filled in with grout which will accentuate the lines....I just hope I haven't left to big of a gap. In hindsight it might have been smarter to start on something smaller. Too late now!

I'm going to let this dry really well then cover all the edges.  I want it to look like it's wrapped right around the canvas.

I was really into glass for a while so have all the tools I need including this great work surface that catches little pieces of glass and allows you to set up rulers and jigs to make even cuts. Here I cut a long pice of blue then set up a jig and sliced off smaller squares all the same size.

And here I cut longer strips of green.

Once the glass is scored I have this handy dandy tool that breaks it along the score line. It's like a big plastic pliers. Bigger pieces I can snap with my hands....but these tiny pieces are hard to get a hold of. This tool works well.

Glass is messy work so I have a makeshift shop in the basement and have a nice view of the water heater and furnace. It was kind of a gloomy damp day....so I was OK being in the basement. 

How hard can it be? So far so good...we'll see how the rest goes.