Glassblowing

Yay! Last post for the night and I will be caught up too!

So one of the reasons we had to come back from CA is that we had this groupon scheduled. It was for an intro glassblowing course. We were all not really wanting to go as we were pretty worn out and tired from the day before. But we dragged our butts down there and of course, we had a great time!

So you get to pick your mold and colors for a flower. Then you get to get a glob of glass (all with help) and then you mush it in the color. Then you put that in the glory hole (probably the only term I actually remember). You sort of meld the colored glass with the other glob of glass. Then you take that to this bench and you use these tweezer things to pinch it. Then they would add another glob of hot glass to your existing glob and put it in the mold! That's all very technical, I know, but that is the best I can describe it. I have some pictures and video that might make it easier to understand.

They did give the option of paying to do a 2nd flower or a flower with a stem or a pumpkin. We had so much fun we decided to do the extras.

There was much discussion and debate about what mold and colors to use

This is the glory hole

This is putting the final glob in the mold.

This is right after you stamp the mold and then dump it out!

This is where you use the tweezers

This video is where they were stamping John's into the mold and then dumping it out.

Bart working the glory hole

Stephanie and the glory hole

This one is Stephanie making her pumpkin. This one we actually did blow.

This video is John using the tweezers on his flower with a stem

This video is Stephanie on the bench where they expand the pumpkin and score it.