To tack or not to tack...

Saturday, I was straightening up my work area and ran across some transparent glass that I had purchased a while ago. I sat down and started experimenting with the colors - layering blues and greens, yellows and browns. I pieced together a few small pendants and prepared to fire them.

I had to decide if I would fully fuse them or tack fuse them. I went the tack route, although, I put a few aside because I really want to see what happens to the transparent glass when the pieces fully fuse together.

Tack fusing occurs at a lower temperature than full fuse. For me, it's between 1300 and 1400 degrees. Basically, it's fusing the separate pieces together, but stopping before the pieces lose their actual shapes. It gives you a kind of layered look. I keep a close eye on the pieces in the kiln and stop the process when the desired look is achieved.

Here are the pieces from the weekend.

 

 

 

 

Time and Love

Gifts of time and love are surely the basic ingredients of a truly merry Christmas.
- Peg Bracken

This past weekend, I spent some time on another batch of Christmas pendants. I made more of the snowflake pendants, experimenting with different types, textures and colors of glass. I also made more trees. I love playing around with these, seeing how many variations can be created on a theme. I did a few that were tack fused rather than doing a full fuse. This just means that I don't bring them all the way up to 1550 degrees, but rather hold them at a lower temperature. Tack fusing allows the glass to melt together, but it retains more texture and shape. You an see tack fusing in some of the pendants below.