Kline Art Studio

I'm trying to make this blog a little more personal! Getting to know me.

So today I have a list of things I like...

1) My new short hair cut. Jim's freaked out by it--he says the back is really short. But I love it. I even love the back. My hair does some cool things when it's short!

2) The TV show "Burn Notice," which isn't on for a couple of weeks because of the USOpen. If you haven't watched it, check it out. Jeffrey Donovan is super hot. I could watch him read me the phone book and even find that appealing!

3) The USOpen. I like watching tennis on TV. First, I noticed that the pros aren't killing themselves to get an impossible shot. If they're going to miss it, they miss it. And they don't make every shot. The tennis coach has said that, but I didn't really hear him until I saw it for myself.

4) Playing tennis. Last week Jim and I had a "date." We went out <gasp> after dark! On a Friday night. We went and played tennis for an hour and then limped out to dinner at Portillos. Exercise and grease. Nothing better!

5) The TV show "Snapped." It's on Oxygen and about women who kill. I am obsessed with the show. I cannot believe how many people believe they will get away with murder! Mostly the women kill their husbands on the show. Sometimes they kill bosses, rivals, parents. It's my psychologist mind--I always want to know what makes people tick!

6) John Mayer's new look. Thank God he cut his hair. He doesn't do Shaggy well. (How do I know what John Mayer looks like? I spent an hour at Barnes & Nobel today waiting for Kelly for lunch. Someone left an US magazine laying there, so I read it after reading the beading mags! Caught up on all the important news.

7) The way my muscles ache the day after lifting heavy weights. That ache means you worked the muscle and are strengthening it. That's what I read in some other magazine anyway. Or maybe that ache means you're doing something freakin' wrong and ought to stop lifting weights!

That's all I can think of right now. Maybe tomorrow I'll do a "Things I DisLike" list. Lordy, that could go on and on!

Posted by susiekline at 07:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Fusing glass is more than slapping two pieces of glass together and melting them. Many things need to be taken into account. COE (co-efficiency of expansion) of the glass is the one fusers talk about a lot, but now I find out viscosity also plays a role. Once you have your glass lined up, you have to consider your kiln--fiber or brick? The things that keep your glass from sticking to the inside of the kiln or your kiln shelf--fiber blanket, fiber paper, thinfire paper, kiln wash.

The glass is ready, so is your kiln. But you cannot just turn on your kiln and forget about it. There are firing schedules. And when I tell you that there are as many firing schedules as there are fusers, I wouldn't be lying or exaggerating! You can take your pick of the quick or the looooonnnngggg. I've seen schedules that run the gamut from a little over an hour to thirteen hours! Amazing!

And fusers are willing to fight to the death (OK, this is an exaggeration--sort of!) over which schedule is right.

But I'm beginning to think that there really is no "right" fusing schedule. There's whatever works for you. And it takes A LOT of experimenting to find that schedule.

I've had luck with a really fast schedule. But when I tried it with a bigger piece it failed. First, I had a breakage. So I tweaked it and it worked...but I got some bubbles between a layer of white and a layer of clear. Nothing horrific--certainly not "boob"les. Distressing enough to send me on the search for the holy grail--I mean, the perfect fusing schedule.

So I've been asking. Trying to understand the logic behind the offered schedules. I've seen no logic yet. Don't get me wrong. People are very helpful. Everything makes sense. But that's the problem...it all makes sense but not in a way that you can look at it and say, "ah hah! I've got it!"

So that's my mission and I choose to take it. To find the perfect firing schedule for me!

I am teaching a beginning fusing class in October, and I am not willing to offer anything but the fusing schedules offered by Bullseye and Spectrum. I will tell the students that there are options and stress that they, too, will have to do the search for themselves if they have their own kilns.

Wait! After fusing the glass and ending up with a passable piece of glass art, you have to worry about annealing your glass art. Improper annealing=breaking glass somewhere down the line. It could be minutes, hours, day, months...but it will happen if you haven't annealed the right way.

What is annealing? It's the cool down of the glass and getting those pesky glass molecules--the ones involved in COE and viscosity, I believe--back into some sort of alignment. A glass trade agreement, simply. The different types of glass come together and agree to get along and not to break when someone is wearing it or using it or showing it off. Remember, though, that annealing has nothing to do with the breakage of glass on a tile floor when dropped or thrown. That's just human error!

So you have to add an annealing phase to your fusing schedule. Again, some controversy. To shut off and walk away or to not shut off and slowly drop the kiln temperature so that the glass temperatures even out, those aforementioned molecules regain alignment, and annealing has occurred.

But! There is also pesky devitrification that can ruin your glass. If you come down in temperature too slowly, your glass can grow a scum. And you ruin your glass art just when you thought you were safe. I'll talk about "devit" when I get more of a handle on it. Frankly, I've got enough thundering through my brain with viscosity...COE...Celcius vs. farenheit...annealing...

Posted by susiekline at 06:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I haven't done much lately because it has been to darn hot to even torch. I've braved the hot garage a few times and made a few beads while sweat pours off me.

Here's a bracelet that is now for sale on Etsy.

Here are some more hearts.

The heart below was made on a 5/32" mandrel. I want to make more of these! Very cool!

I'm doing a Halloween swap on Lampwork Etc. These are some of my first attempts at bats, ghosts, and pumpkins. I still need some practice! Lots of practice!

I've been playing with frit (crumbs of glass) and love how it's working for me!

Here is a cool picture. Don't the beads look like the hovering in space?!

Posted by susiekline at 05:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)